Customize Read and Write Access Policies for Starburst

Private preview

Write policies are only available to select accounts. Contact your Immuta representative to enable this feature.

Requirements

Starburst version 438 or newer
Write policies for Starburst enabled. Contact your Immuta representative to get this feature enabled on your account.

Configuration options

In its default setting, the Starburst integration's write access value controls the authorization of SQL operations that perform data modification (such as INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, MERGE, and TRUNCATE). However, administrators can allow table modification operations (such as ALTER and DROP tables) to be authorized as write operations. Two locations allow administrators to specify how read and write access policies are applied to data in Starburst. Select one or both of the options below to customize these settings. If the access-control.properties file is used, it may override the policies configured in the Immuta web service.

Immuta web service: Configure write policies in the Immuta web service to allow all Starburst clusters targeting that Immuta tenant to receive the same write policy configuration for data sources. This configuration will only affect tables or views registered as Immuta data sources.
Starburst cluster: Configure write policies using the access-control.properties file to broadly customize access for Immuta users on a specific Starburst cluster. This configuration file takes precedence over write policies passed from the Immuta web service. Use this option if all Immuta users should have the same level of access to tables regardless of the write policy setting in the Immuta web service.

Immuta web service configuration

Contact your Immuta representative to configure read and write access in the Immuta web service if all Starburst data source operations should be affected identically across Starburst clusters connected to your Immuta tenant. A configuration example is provided below.

Configuration example

The following example maps WRITE to READ, WRITE and OWN permissions and READ to just READ. Both READ and WRITE permissions should always include READ:

accessGrantMapping:
  WRITE: ['READ', 'WRITE', 'OWN']
  READ: ['READ']

Given the above configuration, when a user gets write access to a Starburst data source, they will have both data and table modification permissions on that data source. See the Starburst privileges section of the Subscription policy access types guide for details about these operations.

Starburst cluster configuration

Configure the integration to allow read and write policies to apply to any data source (registered or unregistered in Immuta) on a Starburst cluster.

Create the Immuta access control configuration file in the Starburst configuration directory (/etc/starburst/immuta-access-control.properties for Docker installations or <starburst_install_directory>/etc/immuta-access-control.properties for standalone installations).
Modify one or both properties below to customize the behavior of read or write access policies for all users:
- immuta.allowed.immuta.datasource.operations: This property governs objects (catalogs, schemas, tables, etc.) that are registered as data sources in Immuta. For these permissions to apply, the user must be subscribed to the data source in Immuta and not be an administrator (who gets all permissions).
  - READ: Grants SELECT on tables or views; grants SHOW on tables, views, or columns
  - WRITE: Grants INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, MERGE, or TRUNCATE on tables; grants REFRESH on materialized views.
  - OWN: Grants ALTER and DROP on tables; grants SET on comments and properties
- immuta.allowed.non.immuta.datasource.operations: This property governs objects (catalogs, schemas, tables, etc.) that are not registered as data sources in Immuta. Use all or a combination of the following access values:
  - READ: Grants SELECT on tables or views; grants SHOW on tables, views, or columns
  - WRITE: Grants INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, MERGE, or TRUNCATE on tables; grants REFRESH on materialized views.
  - OWN: Grants ALTER and DROP on tables; grants SET on comments and properties
  - CREATE: Grants CREATE on catalogs, schema, tables, and views. This is the only property that can allow CREATE permissions, since CREATE is enforced on new objects that do not exist in Starburst or Immuta yet (such as a new table being created with CREATE TABLE).
For example, the following configuration allows READ, WRITE, and OWN operations to be authorized on data sources registered in Immuta and all operations are permitted on data that is not registered in Immuta:
```
immuta.allowed.immuta.datasource.operations=READ,WRITE,OWN
immuta.allowed.non.immuta.datasource.operations=READ,WRITE,CREATE,OWN
```
Enable the Immuta access control plugin in the Starburst cluster's configuration file (/etc/starburst/config.properties for Docker installations or <starburst_install_directory>/etc/config.properties for standalone installations). For example,
```
access-control.config-files=/etc/starburst/immuta-access-control.properties
```