Manage Roles

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New in v2.0: Roles are SQL groups that contain any number of users and roles as members. To create and manage your cluster's roles, use the following statements:

Terminology

To get started, basic role terminology is outlined below:

Term	Description
Role	A group containing any number of users or other roles.
Role admin	A member of the role that's allowed to modify role membership. To create a role admin, use `WITH ADMIN OPTION`.
Superuser / Admin	A member of the `admin` role. Only superusers can `CREATE ROLE` or `DROP ROLE`. The `admin` role is created by default and cannot be dropped.
`root`	A user that exists by default as a member of the `admin` role. The `root` user must always be a member of the `admin` role.
Inherit	The behavior that grants a role's privileges to its members.
Direct member	A user or role that is an immediate member of the role. Example: `A` is a member of `B`.
Indirect member	A user or role that is a member of the role by association. Example: `A` is a member of `C` ... is a member of `B` where "..." is an arbitrary number of memberships.

Example

For the purpose of this example, you need:

An enterprise license
One CockroachDB node running in insecure mode:
```
$ cockroach start \
--insecure \
--store=roles \
--host=localhost
```

In a new terminal, as the root user, use the cockroach user command to create a new user, maxroach:

$ cockroach user set maxroach --insecure

As the root user, open the built-in SQL client:

$ cockroach sql --insecure

Create a database and set it as the default:

> CREATE DATABASE test_roles;

> SET DATABASE = test_roles;

Now, let's create a role:

> CREATE ROLE system_ops;

See what roles are in our databases:

> SHOW ROLES;

+------------+
|  rolename  |
+------------+
| admin      |
| system_ops |
+------------+

Next, grant privileges to the system_ops role you created:

> GRANT CREATE, SELECT ON DATABASE test_roles TO system_ops;

> SHOW GRANTS ON DATABASE test_roles;

+------------+--------------------+------------+------------+
|  Database  |       Schema       |    User    | Privileges |
+------------+--------------------+------------+------------+
| test_roles | crdb_internal      | admin      | ALL        |
| test_roles | crdb_internal      | root       | ALL        |
| test_roles | crdb_internal      | system_ops | CREATE     |
| test_roles | crdb_internal      | system_ops | SELECT     |
| test_roles | information_schema | admin      | ALL        |
| test_roles | information_schema | root       | ALL        |
| test_roles | information_schema | system_ops | CREATE     |
| test_roles | information_schema | system_ops | SELECT     |
| test_roles | pg_catalog         | admin      | ALL        |
| test_roles | pg_catalog         | root       | ALL        |
| test_roles | pg_catalog         | system_ops | CREATE     |
| test_roles | pg_catalog         | system_ops | SELECT     |
| test_roles | public             | admin      | ALL        |
| test_roles | public             | root       | ALL        |
| test_roles | public             | system_ops | CREATE     |
| test_roles | public             | system_ops | SELECT     |
+------------+--------------------+------------+------------+

Now, add the maxroach user to the system_ops role:

> GRANT system_ops TO maxroach;

To test the privileges you just added to the system_ops role, use \q or ctrl-d to exit the interactive shell, and then open the shell again as the maxroach user (who is a member of the system_ops role):

$ cockroach sql --user=maxroach --database=test_roles --insecure

Create a table:

> CREATE TABLE employees (
    id UUID DEFAULT uuid_v4()::UUID PRIMARY KEY,
    profile JSONB
  );

You were able to create the table because maxroach has CREATE privileges. Now, try to drop the table:

> DROP TABLE employees;

pq: user maxroach does not have DROP privilege on relation employees

You cannot drop the table because your current user (maxroach) is a member of the system_ops role, which doesn't have DROP privileges.

maxroach has CREATE and SELECT privileges, so try a SHOW statement:

> SHOW GRANTS ON TABLE employees;

+------------+--------+-----------+------------+------------+
|  Database  | Schema |   Table   |    User    | Privileges |
+------------+--------+-----------+------------+------------+
| test_roles | public | employees | admin      | ALL        |
| test_roles | public | employees | root       | ALL        |
| test_roles | public | employees | system_ops | CREATE     |
| test_roles | public | employees | system_ops | SELECT     |
+------------+--------+-----------+------------+------------+

Let's switch back to the root user to test more of the SQL statements related to roles. Log out of the maxroach user by exiting the interactive shell. To exit the interactive shell, use \q or ctrl-d.

Open cockroach sql as the root user:

$ cockroach sql --insecure

Now that you're logged in as the root user, revoke privileges and then drop the system_ops role.

> REVOKE ALL ON DATABASE test_roles FROM system_ops;

> SHOW GRANTS ON DATABASE test_roles;

+------------+--------------------+-------+------------+
|  Database  |       Schema       | User  | Privileges |
+------------+--------------------+-------+------------+
| test_roles | crdb_internal      | admin | ALL        |
| test_roles | crdb_internal      | root  | ALL        |
| test_roles | information_schema | admin | ALL        |
| test_roles | information_schema | root  | ALL        |
| test_roles | pg_catalog         | admin | ALL        |
| test_roles | pg_catalog         | root  | ALL        |
| test_roles | public             | admin | ALL        |
| test_roles | public             | root  | ALL        |
+------------+--------------------+-------+------------+

> REVOKE ALL ON TABLE test_roles.* FROM system_ops;

> SHOW GRANTS ON TABLE test_roles.*;

+------------+--------+-----------+-------+------------+
|  Database  | Schema |   Table   | User  | Privileges |
+------------+--------+-----------+-------+------------+
| test_roles | public | employees | admin | ALL        |
| test_roles | public | employees | root  | ALL        |
+------------+--------+-----------+-------+------------+

Note:

All of a role or user's privileges must be revoked before it can be dropped.

> DROP ROLE system_ops;

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Manage Roles

Terminology

Example

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