postgresql

Table of Contents

1. Overview - What is the PostgreSQL module?
2. Module Description - What does the module do?
3. Setup - The basics of getting started with PostgreSQL module
4. Usage - How to use the module for various tasks
5. Reference - The classes, defines,functions and facts available in this module
6. Limitations - OS compatibility, etc.
7. Development - Guide for contributing to the module
8. Disclaimer - Licensing information
9. Transfer Notice - Notice of authorship change
10. Contributors - List of module contributors

Overview

The PostgreSQL module allows you to easily manage postgres databases with Puppet.

Module Description

PostgreSQL is a high-performance, free, open-source relational database server. The postgresql module allows you to manage PostgreSQL packages and services on several operating systems, while also supporting basic management of PostgreSQL databases and users. The module offers support for managing firewall for postgres ports on RedHat-based distros, as well as support for basic management of common security settings.

Setup

What puppetlabs-PostgreSQL affects:

• package/service/configuration files for PostgreSQL
• listened-to ports
• system firewall (optional)
• IP and mask (optional)

Introductory Questions

The postgresql module offers many security configuration settings. Before getting started, you will want to consider:

• Do you want/need to allow remote connections?
  • If yes, what about TCP connections?
• Would you prefer to work around your current firewall settings or overwrite some of them?
• How restrictive do you want the database superuser's permissions to be?

Your answers to these questions will determine which of the module's parameters you'll want to specify values for.

###Configuring the server

The main configuration you’ll need to do will be around the postgresql::server class. The default parameters are reasonable, but fairly restrictive regarding permissions for who can connect and from where. To manage a PostgreSQL server with sane defaults:

include postgresql::server

For a more customized, less restrictive configuration:

class { 'postgresql::server':
  config_hash => {
    'ip_mask_deny_postgres_user' => '0.0.0.0/32',
    'ip_mask_allow_all_users'    => '0.0.0.0/0',
    'listen_addresses'           => '*',
    'ipv4acls'                   => ['hostssl all johndoe 192.168.0.0/24 cert'],
    'manage_redhat_firewall'     => true,
    'manage_pg_hba_conf'         => false,
    'postgres_password'          => 'TPSrep0rt!',
  },
}

Once you've completed your configuration of postgresql::server, you can test out your settings from the command line:

$ psql -h localhost -U postgres
$ psql -h my.postgres.server -U

If you get an error message from these commands, it means that your permissions are set in a way that restricts access from where you’re trying to connect. That might be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your goals.

Advanced configuration setting parameters can be placed into postgresql_puppet_extras.conf (located in the same folder as postgresql.conf). You can manage that file as a normal puppet file resource, or however you see fit; which gives you complete control over the settings. Any value you specify in that file will override any existing value set in the templated version.

For more details about server configuration parameters consult the PostgreSQL Runtime Configuration docs.

Usage

###Creating a database

There are many ways to set up a postgres database using the postgresql::db class. For instance, to set up a database for PuppetDB (this assumes you’ve already got the postgresql::server set up to your liking in your manifest, as discussed above):

postgresql::db { 'mydatabasename':
  user     => 'mydatabaseuser',
  password => 'mypassword'
}

###Managing users, roles and permissions

To manage users, roles and permissions:

postgresql::database_user{'marmot':
  password_hash => 'foo',
}

postgresql::database_grant { 'test1':
  privilege => 'ALL',
  db        => 'test1',
  role      => 'dan',
}

postgresql::table_grant { 'my_table of test2':
  privilege => 'ALL',
  table     => 'my_table',
  db        => 'test2',
  role      => 'dan',
}

In this example, you would grant ALL privileges on the test1 database and on the my_table table of the test2 database to the user or group specified by dan.

At this point, you would just need to plunk these database name/username/password values into your PuppetDB config files, and you are good to go.

Reference

The postgresql module comes with many options for configuring the server. While you are unlikely to use all of the below settings, they allow you a decent amount of control over your security settings.

Classes:

• postgresql
• postgresql::server
• postgresql::client
• postgresql::contrib
• postgresql::devel
• postgresql::java
• postgresql::python

Resources:

• postgresql::db
• postgresql::database
• postgresql::database_grant
• postgresql::table_grant
• postgresql::role
• postgresql::tablespace
• postgresql::validate_db_connection
• postgresql::pg_hba_rule

Functions:

• postgresql_password
• postgresql_acls_to_resources_hash

Facts:

• postgres_default_version

###Class: postgresql This class is used to configure the main settings for this module, to be used by the other classes and defined resources. On its own it does nothing.

For example, if you wanted to overwrite the default locale and charset you could use the following combination:

class { 'postgresql':
  charset => 'UTF8',
  locale  => 'en_NG',
}->
class { 'postgresql::server':
}

That would make the charset and locale the default for all classes and defined resources in this module.

####version The version of PostgreSQL to install/manage. Defaults to your operating system default.

####manage_package_repo If true this will setup the official PostgreSQL repositories on your host. Defaults to false.

####locale This will set the default database locale for all databases created with this module. On certain operating systems this will be used during the template1 initialization as well so it becomes a default outside of the module as well. Defaults to undef which is effectively C.

####charset This will set the default charset for all databases created with this module. On certain operating systems this will be used during the template1 initialization as well so it becomes a default outside of the module as well. Defaults to UTF8.

####datadir This setting can be used to override the default postgresql data directory for the target platform. If not specified, the module will use whatever directory is the default for your OS distro.

####confdir This setting can be used to override the default postgresql configuration directory for the target platform. If not specified, the module will use whatever directory is the default for your OS distro.

####bindir This setting can be used to override the default postgresql binaries directory for the target platform. If not specified, the module will use whatever directory is the default for your OS distro.

####client_package_name This setting can be used to override the default postgresql client package name. If not specified, the module will use whatever package name is the default for your OS distro.

####server_package_name This setting can be used to override the default postgresql server package name. If not specified, the module will use whatever package name is the default for your OS distro.

####contrib_package_name This setting can be used to override the default postgresql contrib package name. If not specified, the module will use whatever package name is the default for your OS distro.

####devel_package_name This setting can be used to override the default postgresql devel package name. If not specified, the module will use whatever package name is the default for your OS distro.

####java_package_name This setting can be used to override the default postgresql java package name. If not specified, the module will use whatever package name is the default for your OS distro.

####service_name This setting can be used to override the default postgresql service name. If not specified, the module will use whatever service name is the default for your OS distro.

####user This setting can be used to override the default postgresql super user and owner of postgresql related files in the file system. If not specified, the module will use the user name 'postgres'.

####group This setting can be used to override the default postgresql user group to be used for related files in the file system. If not specified, the module will use the group name 'postgres'.

####run_initdb This setting can be used to explicitly call the initdb operation after server package is installed and before the postgresql service is started. If not specified, the module will decide whether to call initdb or not depending on your OS distro.

###Class: postgresql::server Here are the options that you can set in the config_hash parameter of postgresql::server:

####ensure This value default to present. When set to absent it will remove all packages, configuration and data so use this with extreme caution.

####postgres_password This value defaults to undef, meaning the super user account in the postgres database is a user called postgres and this account does not have a password. If you provide this setting, the module will set the password for the postgres user to your specified value.

####listen_addresses This value defaults to localhost, meaning the postgres server will only accept connections from localhost. If you’d like to be able to connect to postgres from remote machines, you can override this setting. A value of * will tell postgres to accept connections from any remote machine. Alternately, you can specify a comma-separated list of hostnames or IP addresses. (For more info, have a look at the postgresql.conf file from your system’s postgres package).

####manage_redhat_firewall This value defaults to false. Many RedHat-based distros ship with a fairly restrictive firewall configuration which will block the port that postgres tries to listen on. If you’d like for the puppet module to open this port for you (using the puppetlabs-firewall module), change this value to true. [This parameter is likely to change in future versions. Possible changes include support for non-RedHat systems and finer-grained control over the firewall rule (currently, it simply opens up the postgres port to all TCP connections).]

####manage_pg_hba_conf This value defaults to true. Whether or not manage the pg_hba.conf. If set to true, puppet will overwrite this file. If set to false, puppet will not modify the file.

####ip_mask_allow_all_users This value defaults to 127.0.0.1/32. By default, Postgres does not allow any database user accounts to connect via TCP from remote machines. If you’d like to allow them to, you can override this setting. You might set it to 0.0.0.0/0 to allow database users to connect from any remote machine, or 192.168.0.0/16 to allow connections from any machine on your local 192.168 subnet.

####ip_mask_deny_postgres_user This value defaults to 0.0.0.0/0. Sometimes it can be useful to block the superuser account from remote connections if you are allowing other database users to connect remotely. Set this to an IP and mask for which you want to deny connections by the postgres superuser account. So, e.g., the default value of 0.0.0.0/0 will match any remote IP and deny access, so the postgres user won’t be able to connect remotely at all. Conversely, a value of 0.0.0.0/32 would not match any remote IP, and thus the deny rule will not be applied and the postgres user will be allowed to connect.

####pg_hba_conf_path If, for some reason, your system stores the pg_hba.conf file in a non-standard location, you can override the path here.

####postgresql_conf_path If, for some reason, your system stores the postgresql.conf file in a non-standard location, you can override the path here.

####ipv4acls List of strings for access control for connection method, users, databases, IPv4 addresses; see postgresql documentation about pg_hba.conf for information (please note that the link will take you to documentation for the most recent version of Postgres, however links for earlier versions can be found on that page).

####ipv6acls List of strings for access control for connection method, users, databases, IPv6 addresses; see postgresql documentation about pg_hba.conf for information (please note that the link will take you to documentation for the most recent version of Postgres, however links for earlier versions can be found on that page).

###Class: postgresql::client

This class installs postgresql client software. Alter the following parameters if you have a custom version you would like to install (Note: don't forget to make sure to add any necessary yum or apt repositories if specifying a custom version):

####package_name The name of the postgresql client package.

####package_ensure The ensure parameter passed on to postgresql client package resource.

###Class: postgresql::contrib Installs the postgresql contrib package.

####package_name The name of the postgresql client package.

####package_ensure The ensure parameter passed on to postgresql contrib package resource.

###Class: postgresql::devel Installs the packages containing the development libraries for PostgreSQL.

####package_ensure Override for the ensure parameter during package installation. Defaults to present.

####package_name Overrides the default package name for the distribution you are installing to. Defaults to postgresql-devel or postgresql<version>-devel depending on your distro.

###Class: postgresql::java This class installs postgresql bindings for Java (JDBC). Alter the following parameters if you have a custom version you would like to install (Note: don't forget to make sure to add any necessary yum or apt repositories if specifying a custom version):

####package_name The name of the postgresql java package.

####package_ensure The ensure parameter passed on to postgresql java package resource.

###Class: postgresql::python This class installs the postgresql Python libraries. For customer requirements you can customise the following parameters:

####package_name The name of the postgresql python package.

####package_ensure The ensure parameter passed on to postgresql python package resource.

###Resource: postgresql::db This is a convenience resource that creates a database, user and assigns necessary permissions in one go.

For example, to create a database called test1 with a corresponding user of the same name, you can use:

postgresql::db { 'test1':
  user     => 'test1',
  password => 'test1',
}

####namevar The namevar for the resource designates the name of the database.

####user User to create and assign access to the database upon creation. Mandatory.

####password Password for the created user. Mandatory.

####tablespace The name of the tablespace to allocate this database to. If not specifies, it defaults to the PostgreSQL default.

####charset Override the character set during creation of the database. Defaults to the default defined during installation.

####locale Override the locale during creation of the database. Defaults to the default defined during installation.

####grant Grant permissions during creation. Defaults to ALL.

###Resource: postgresql::database This defined type can be used to create a database with no users and no permissions, which is a rare use case.

####namevar Name of the database to create.

####owner Name of the database user who should be set as the owner of the database. Defaults to $postgresql::params::user.

####tablespace Tablespace for where to create this database. Defaults to the defaults defined during PostgreSQL installation.

####charset Override the character set during creation of the database. Defaults to the default defined during installation.

####locale Override the locale during creation of the database. Defaults to the default defined during installation.

###Resource: postgresql::database_grant This defined type manages grant based access privileges for users. Consult the PostgreSQL documentation for grant for more information.

####namevar Used to uniquely identify this resource, but functionality not used during grant.

####privilege Can be one of SELECT, TEMPORARY, TEMP, CONNECT. ALL is used as a synonym for CREATE. If you need to add multiple privileges, a space delimited string can be used.

####db Database to grant access to.

####role Role or user whom you are granting access for.

####psql_db Database to execute the grant against. This should not ordinarily be changed from the default, which is postgres.

####psql_user OS user for running psql. Defaults to the default user for the module, usually postgres.

###Resource: postgresql::table_grant This defined type manages grant based access privileges for users. Consult the PostgreSQL documentation for grant for more information.

####namevar Used to uniquely identify this resource, but functionality not used during grant.

####privilege Can be one of SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, REFERENCES. ALL is used as a synonym for CREATE. If you need to add multiple privileges, a space delimited string can be used.

####table Table to grant access on.

####db Database of table.

####role Role or user whom you are granting access for.

####psql_db Database to execute the grant against. This should not ordinarily be changed from the default, which is postgres.

####psql_user OS user for running psql. Defaults to the default user for the module, usually postgres.

###Resource: postgresql::role This resource creates a role or user in PostgreSQL.

####namevar The role name to create.

####password_hash The hash to use during password creation. Use the postgresql_password function to provide an MD5 hash here.

####createdb Weither to grant the ability to create new databases with this role. Defaults to false.

####createrole Weither to grant the ability to create new roles with this role. Defaults to false.

####login Weither to grant login capability for the new role. Defaults to false.

####superuser Weither to grant super user capability for the new role. Defaults to false.

####replication If true provides replication capabilities for this role. Defaults to false.

####connection_limit Specifies how many concurrent connections the role can make. Defaults to -1 meaning no limit.

###Resource: postgresql::tablespace This defined type can be used to create a tablespace. For example:

postgresql::tablespace{ 'tablespace1':
  location => '/srv/space1',
}

It will create the location if necessary, assigning it the same permissions as your PostgreSQL server.

####namevar The tablespace name to create.

####location The path to locate this tablespace.

####owner The default owner of the tablespace.

###Resource: postgresql::validate_db_connection This resource can be utilised inside composite manifests to validate that a client has a valid connection with a remote PostgreSQL database. It can be ran from any node where the PostgreSQL client software is installed to validate connectivity before commencing other dependent tasks in your Puppet manifests, so it is often used when chained to other tasks such as: starting an application server, performing a database migration.

Example usage:

postgresql::validate_db_connection { 'validate my postgres connection':
  database_host           => 'my.postgres.host',
  database_username       => 'mydbuser',
  database_password       => 'mydbpassword',
  database_name           => 'mydbname',
}->
exec { 'rake db:migrate':
  cwd => '/opt/myrubyapp',
}

####namevar Uniquely identify this resource, but functionally does nothing.

####database_host The hostname of the database you wish to test.

####database_port Port to use when connecting.

####database_name The name of the database you wish to test.

####database_username Username to connect with.

####database_password Password to connect with. Can be left blank, but that is not recommended.

###Resource: postgresql::pg_hba_rule This defined type allows you to create an access rule for pg_hba.conf. For more details see the PostgreSQL documentation.

For example:

postgresql::pg_hba_rule { 'allow application network to access app database':
  description => "Open up postgresql for access from 200.1.2.0/24",
  type => 'host',
  database => 'app',
  user => 'app',
  address => '200.1.2.0/24',
  auth_method => 'md5',
}

This would create a ruleset in pg_hba.conf similar to:

# Rule Name: allow application network to access app database
# Description: Open up postgresql for access from 200.1.2.0/24
# Order: 150
host  app  app  200.1.2.0/24  md5

####namevar A unique identifier or short description for this rule. The namevar doesn't provide any functional usage, but it is stored in the comments of the produced pg_hba.conf so the originating resource can be identified.

####description A longer description for this rule if required. Defaults to none. This description is placed in the comments above the rule in pg_hba.conf.

####type The type of rule, this is usually one of: local, host, hostssl or hostnossl.

####database A comma separated list of databases that this rule matches.

####user A comma separated list of database users that this rule matches.

####address If the type is not 'local' you can provide a CIDR based address here for rule matching.

####auth_method The auth_method is described further in the pg_hba.conf documentation, but it provides the method that is used for authentication for the connection that this rule matches.

####auth_option For certain auth_method settings there are extra options that can be passed. Consult the PostgreSQL pg_hba.conf documentation for further details.

####order An order for placing the rule in pg_hba.conf. Defaults to 150.

####target This provides the target for the rule, and is generally an internal only property. Use with caution.

###Function: postgresql_password If you need to generate a postgres encrypted password, use postgresql_password. You can call it from your production manifests if you don't mind them containing the clear text versions of your passwords, or you can call it from the command line and then copy and paste the encrypted password into your manifest:

$ puppet apply --execute 'notify { "test": message => postgresql_password("username", "password") }'

###Function: postgresql_acls_to_resources_hash(acl_array, id, order_offset) This internal function converts a list of pg_hba.conf based acls (passed in as an array of strings) to a format compatible with the postgresql::pg_hba_rule resource.

This function should only be used internally by the module.

###Fact: postgres_default_version The module provides a Facter fact that can be used to determine what the default version of postgres is for your operating system/distribution. Depending on the distribution, it might be 8.1, 8.4, 9.1, or possibly another version. This can be useful in a few cases, like when building path strings for the postgres directories.

Limitations

Works with versions of PostgreSQL from 8.1 through 9.2.

Development

Puppet Labs modules on the Puppet Forge are open projects, and community contributions are essential for keeping them great. We can't access the huge number of platforms and myriad of hardware, software, and deployment configurations that Puppet is intended to serve.

We want to keep it as easy as possible to contribute changes so that our modules work in your environment. There are a few guidelines that we need contributors to follow so that we can have a chance of keeping on top of things.

You can read the complete module contribution guide on the Puppet Labs wiki.

Tests

There are two types of tests distributed with the module. Unit tests with rspec-puppet and system tests using rspec-system.

For unit testing, make sure you have:

• rake
• bundler

Install the necessary gems:

bundle install --path=vendor

And then run the unit tests:

bundle exec rake spec

The unit tests are ran in Travis-CI as well, if you want to see the results of your own tests regsiter the service hook through Travis-CI via the accounts section for your Github clone of this project.

If you want to run the system tests, make sure you also have:

• vagrant > 1.2.x
• Virtualbox > 4.2.10

Then run the tests using:

bundle exec rake spec:system

To run the tests on different operating systems, see the sets available in .nodeset.yml and run the specific set with the following syntax:

RSPEC_SET=debian-607-x64 bundle exec rake spec:system

Transfer Notice

This Puppet module was originally authored by Inkling Systems. The maintainer preferred that Puppet Labs take ownership of the module for future improvement and maintenance as Puppet Labs is using it in the PuppetDB module. Existing pull requests and issues were transferred over, please fork and continue to contribute here instead of Inkling.

Previously: https://github.com/inkling/puppet-postgresql

Contributors

• Andrew Moon
• Kenn Knowles (@kennknowles)
• Adrien Thebo
• Albert Koch
• Andreas Ntaflos
• Brett Porter
• Chris Price
• dharwood
• Etienne Pelletier
• Florin Broasca
• Henrik
• Hunter Haugen
• Jari Bakken
• Jordi Boggiano
• Ken Barber
• nzakaria
• Richard Arends
• Spenser Gilliland
• stormcrow
• William Van Hevelingen