> But the pg_shadow authentication is based on credentials
> provided by the
> client whereas what you propose here would run on the server, so this
> doesn't make sense.
Since you can write extensions to PostgreSQL that reach far into the OS,
it does make sense to execute those extensions under a "non priviledged"
user, and not postgres. This OS user would somehow be tied to the username
that the client passes as his credentials (and that we trust to be
authenticated).
This is actually not my idea, it is implemented in Informix, DB2 and I think
Oracle.
Andreas