Setting up cloud security using predefined roles

Many Databases as a Service (DBaaS)/database clouds restrict the use of superusers, with good reason. Administrators in a database cloud need to use an intermediate level of authority.

For example, in the EDB BigAnimal cloud service, a user called edb_admin holds most privileges, including CREATEROLE and CREATEDB. BigAnimal runs within your own account on cloud platforms, so the service provides data isolation, which in turn makes it easier and safer to administer than other clouds.

In prior releases of PostgreSQL, many functions were superuser-only, but these functions and views are now just superuser by default.

Rather than have administrators work out for themselves how to set up admin privileges, PostgreSQL now provides predefined roles, previously known as default roles, which can be thought of as useful groupings of privileges to grant to different types of administrators.

Getting ready

Set up a cloud account...