Mastering PostgreSQL 9.6

Managing pg_hba.conf

After configuring bind addresses, we can move on to the next level. The pg_hba.conf file will tell PostgreSQL how to authenticate people coming over the network. In general, pg_hba.conf file entries have the following layout:

# local      DATABASE  USER  METHOD  [OPTIONS] # host       DATABASE  USER  ADDRESS  METHOD  [OPTIONS] # hostssl    DATABASE  USER  ADDRESS  METHOD  [OPTIONS] # hostnossl  DATABASE  USER  ADDRESS  METHOD  [OPTIONS] 

There are four types of rules that can be put into the pg_hba.conf file:

• local: This can be used to configure local Unix socket connections.
• host: This can be used for SSL and non-SSL connections.
• hostssl: These are only valid for SSL connections. To make use of this option, SSL must be compiled into the server, ...