Re: SYSTEM_USER reserved word implementation

Joe Conway <mail@joeconway.com> writes:
> On 6/22/22 11:52, Tom Lane wrote:
>> I think a case could be made for ONLY returning non-null when authn_id
>> represents some externally-verified identifier (OS user ID gotten via
>> peer identification, Kerberos principal, etc).

> But -1 on that.

> I think any time we have a non-null authn_id we should expose it. Are 
> there examples of cases when we have authn_id but for some reason don't 
> trust the value of it?

I'm more concerned about whether we have a consistent story about what
SYSTEM_USER means (another way of saying "what type is it").  If it's
just the same as SESSION_USER it doesn't seem like we've added much.

Maybe, instead of just being the raw user identifier, it should be
something like "auth_method:user_identifier" so that one can tell
what the identifier actually is and how it was verified.

            regards, tom lane