PostgreSQL

ManagementCore APIServices

PostgreSQL

Setting the Service mode to POSTGRES enables it to operate in application-layer aware PostgreSQL mode. This mode enables you to provide secretless access for Users to the protected upstream PostgreSQL-based server without having to share the upstream's password. This mode also provides you with clear application-layer aware visibility where your Postgres sessions and queries are logged and audited in real-time.

Secretless Access

Secretless access enables you to provide secretless access for authorized Users to POSTGRES-based Service by automatically injecting passwords to authenticate to the upstream PostgreSQL database, and force the User to connect to the upstream as a specific user, possibly with a certain role corresponding to specific permissions, to a specific database.

First, you need to create a Secret to store the password of your upstream SSH server (read more here) as follows:

octeliumctl create secret pg-password
# OR via a --value flag
octeliumctl create secret --value <PASSWORD> pg-password
# OR via a --file flag
octeliumctl create secret --file /PATH/TO/PASSWORD pg-password

Now, you define your Service as follows:

1kind: Service
2metadata:
3  name: pg-db
4spec:
5  mode: POSTGRES
6  port: 5432
7  config:
8    upstream:
9      url: postgres://address-to-pg
10    postgres:
11      user: postgres
12      database: db01
13      auth:
14        password:
15          fromSecret: pg-password
16      sslMode: REQUIRE

Now, the above configuration forces the User to authenticate as postgres with the password value set in the Secret pg-password and connect to the db01 database regardless of the information supplied by the downstream.

NOTE

You can see more examples of using CockroachDB here and NeonDB here.

NOTE

For internal/private PostgreSQL upstreams behind NAT, you need to remotely serve them via a connected octelium client or container as discussed here.

SSL Mode

By default, the Service attempts to use prefer ssl mode (read more here). You can, however, override that default behavior via the sslMode field and explicitly set it to either REQUIRE to force using TLS or DISABLE to disable using TLS. Here is an example:

1kind: Service
2metadata:
3  name: pg-db
4spec:
5  mode: POSTGRES
6  port: 5432
7  config:
8    upstream:
9      url: postgres://address-to-pg
10    postgres:
11      user: postgres
12      database: db01
13      auth:
14        password:
15          fromSecret: pg-password
16      sslMode: REQUIRE

Access Control

You can control access based on the Postgres request information. Such information are stored in ctx.request.postgres where it contains the username and database. Here is a detailed example of a inline Policy that controls access based on Postgres-specific information:

1kind: Service
2metadata:
3  name: svc1
4spec:
5  mode: POSTGRES
6  config:
7   # Your config....
8  authorization:
9    inlinePolicies:
10      - spec:
11          rules:
12            - effect: ALLOW
13              condition:
14                any:
15                  of:
16                    - match: ctx.request.postgres.connect.user == "db-user-1"
17                    - match: ctx.request.postgres.connect.database == "db-01"

NOTE

You do not actually to control access by checking against the database user since you already override the database user in your Service configuration as illustrated above regardless of the database user value provided by the User. You can also use dynamic configuration in order to map different databases and/or database users to different Users under different conditions. You can read more about dynamic configuration here

Dynamic Configuration

You can use dynamic configuration (read more about dynamic configuration here) to, for example, route to different upstreams or different database users with different privileges and roles (e.g. more privileged Users can automatically delete tables or databases while other Users cannot do so) based on identity and/or context. Here is an example:

1kind: Service
2metadata:
3  name: example-svc
4spec:
5  mode: POSTGRES
6  dynamicConfig:
7    configs:
8    - name: prod
9      upstream:
10        url: postgres://address-to-pg
11      postgres:
12        user: prod
13        database: prod-db
14        auth:
15          password:
16            fromSecret: prod-password
17    - name: dev
18      upstream:
19        url: postgres://address-to-pg
20      postgres:
21        user: dev
22        database: dev-db
23        auth:
24          password:
25            fromSecret: dev-password
26    rules:
27    - condition:
28        match: '"prod" in ctx.user.spec.groups'
29      configName: prod
30    - condition:
31        matchAny: true
32      configName: dev

Visibility

The Service emits access logs in real time to the audit collector. Each log provides PostgreSQL application-layer aware information about the request such as the command type, the query details, etc.... Here is an example:

1{
2  "apiVersion": "core/v1",
3  "entry": {
4    "common": {
5      "connectionID": "dnm3-09gn-6rt58k768x9cns8fxbu1w54v-v446-a6fy",
6      "endedAt": "2025-03-21T22:15:32.000550409Z",
7      "isAuthenticated": true,
8      "isAuthorized": true,
9      "namespaceRef": {
10        "apiVersion": "core/v1",
11        "kind": "Namespace",
12        "name": "default",
13        "resourceVersion": "0195b81d-43ec-7ba7-81f7-9b77202b3612",
14        "uid": "bff0768e-eec8-4044-a972-9f7af81b79d8"
15      },
16      "reason": {
17        "details": {
18          "policyMatch": {
19            "inlinePolicy": {
20              "name": "allow-all",
21              "resourceRef": {
22                "apiVersion": "core/v1",
23                "kind": "Group",
24                "name": "g1",
25                "resourceVersion": "0195b821-209b-76f7-bde9-b078e870621c",
26                "uid": "972e1808-7248-468a-ba7c-8da43d33c626"
27              }
28            }
29          }
30        },
31        "type": "POLICY_MATCH"
32      },
33      "regionRef": {
34        "apiVersion": "core/v1",
35        "kind": "Region",
36        "name": "default",
37        "uid": "6e233d12-2fd6-4670-a82d-8c712e1f7374"
38      },
39      "serviceRef": {
40        "apiVersion": "core/v1",
41        "kind": "Service",
42        "name": "pg1.default",
43        "resourceVersion": "0195bac5-10c2-7cb5-a59b-216d19ea7001",
44        "uid": "d4293385-2aa7-4b42-a1a2-4a85803ee21b"
45      },
46      "sessionRef": {
47        "apiVersion": "core/v1",
48        "kind": "Session",
49        "name": "usr1-3pt93j",
50        "resourceVersion": "0195bac2-c5c8-7206-9076-191558cfc9be",
51        "uid": "e8bea7be-b858-4457-a8ee-a0cb7f6c91da"
52      },
53      "startedAt": "2025-03-21T22:15:32.000470456Z",
54      "userRef": {
55        "apiVersion": "core/v1",
56        "kind": "User",
57        "name": "usr1",
58        "resourceVersion": "0195b821-228d-79b2-92f3-4bb458944f97",
59        "uid": "e0f251b2-6952-4a46-a771-2712a45c47f5"
60      }
61    },
62    "info": {
63      "postgres": {
64        "query": {
65          "query": "CREATE DATABASE db01;"
66        },
67        "type": "QUERY"
68      }
69    }
70  },
71  "kind": "AccessLog",
72  "metadata": {
73    "actorRef": {
74      "apiVersion": "core/v1",
75      "kind": "Session",
76      "name": "usr1-3pt93j",
77      "resourceVersion": "0195bac2-c5c8-7206-9076-191558cfc9be",
78      "uid": "e8bea7be-b858-4457-a8ee-a0cb7f6c91da"
79    },
80    "createdAt": "2025-03-21T22:15:32.000522377Z",
81    "id": "qz07-s8ho-pf8t84xm5rhqrmnpttybpspx-aqnp-rkeg",
82    "targetRef": {
83      "apiVersion": "core/v1",
84      "kind": "Service",
85      "name": "pg1.default",
86      "resourceVersion": "0195bac5-10c2-7cb5-a59b-216d19ea7001",
87      "uid": "d4293385-2aa7-4b42-a1a2-4a85803ee21b"
88    }
89  }
90}

As you can see in the above example, the type of this POSTGRES access Log is a QUERY. The POSTGRES mode has currently 8 Log types: SESSION_START, SESSION_END, QUERY, PARSE, CLOSE, EXECUTE, BIND, FUNCTION_CALL and some of these types include different detailed information according to their type. You can read more in the API reference.

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Dynamic Configuration

Visibility