August 2020 Summaries

Supabase, an open-source Firebase alternative, has launched Supabase Auth, a feature that provides backend services for user authentication and authorization. Developers can now easily onboard users with functions like supabase.auth.signUp() and supabase.auth.signIn(). The system also supports Row Level Security (RLS) and policies, allowing developers to write complex SQL rules fitting their unique business needs. Supabase Auth is built using three open-source products: PostgreSQL for authorization, Netlify's GoTrue server for authentication, and PostgREST. Future updates will include custom email templates, 3rd-party OAuth providers, and a simplified policy interface.

Supabase is an open source Firebase alternative built using scalable and open source products, launched after a community-driven push for the addition of authentication features, with Supabase Auth now available, providing user management, row level security, policies, and more, built on top of PostgreSQL and utilizing OSS tools such as KeyCloak and GoTrue server.

In July 2020, Supabase released its highly anticipated feature, Supabase Auth, which simplifies the process of adding authentication to applications. Alongside this release, significant improvements were made to the Table Editor, including multi-level relationship drill down and the ability to add, delete, and download rows. Additionally, new Postgres extensions such as pgsql-http, pgjwt, plpgsql_check, and pljava were introduced. Supabase also added documentation for Auth, a new filter in the client library, and remembers which tabs users had open in the Table View.

This post explains how to use WAL-G, an open-source continuous archiving tool, for setting up and recovering from physical backups in Postgres. It covers the installation of necessary packages, configuring environment variables, enabling WAL archiving, creating physical backups, scheduling regular physical backups, and restoring data after a disaster. The tutorial uses two instances running Postgres databases on Ubuntu 18.04 and Amazon S3 bucket for storing backups.

WAL-G is an open-source continuous archiving tool used to set up and recover from physical backups in Postgres, making it easier to restore database state to a particular moment in time. The tool handles storage and retrieval of physical backups and WAL archives from a chosen cloud storage provider, such as AWS. To set up WAL-G, environment variables are configured, including AWS credentials and resources, and the database is enabled for archiving with specific commands. Regular physical backups can be scheduled using a CRON job to improve recovery time. In case of disaster, physical backups in the S3 bucket can be used to recover and restore data on a new instance by configuring environment variables, stopping the database, switching to the postgres user, preparing the database for recovery, setting restore_command, and restoring from the latest physical backup. Additionally, Point-in-Time Recovery (PITR) can be achieved by setting recovery_target_time and recovery_target_action, allowing restoration of data up to a certain point in time.

Supabase Auth`, a new feature, is being released after 5 months of development. The update aims to make it easy to implement an authentication system in apps using PostgreSQL's Row Level Security. A simple example and video tutorial are available to help developers get started. The Table Editor has been improved with the ability to drill into table relationships multiple levels deep and to add, delete, and download rows. Several new Postgres extensions have also been added, including `pgsql-http`, `pgjwt`, `plpgsql_check`, and `pljava`. Small improvements include updated documentation, a new filter in the client library, and enhanced performance. The update is now live, and developers can start using Supabase Auth today by visiting the dashboard at `supabase.com/dashboard`.