Multiple column + row permissions for the same role

Use case

In some cases we might want to allow access to certain columns for a role only if a particular condition is met while allowing access to other columns based on a different condition i.e. have different column permissions based on different row permissions.

Currently it is not possible to define multiple column + row permission rules for the same role.

We can work around this limitation by using views.

Example

Let’s say we have a table called user_info with columns (id, name, city, email, phone, address).

We want the role user to be able to access:

  • the email, phone and address columns only if the id column is the requesting user’s id i.e. the current user is the owner of the row.
  • the id, name and city columns for all rows.

We can achieve this via the following steps:

Step 1: Create a view

Create a view called user_private with columns (user_id, email, phone, address):

CREATE VIEW user_private AS
  SELECT id AS user_id, email, phone, address
    FROM user_info;

Step 2: Create a relationship

For the table user_info, create a manual object relationship called private_info using user_info : id -> user_private : user_id:

Create a manual object relationship

Step 3: Define permissions

For the role user, create the following permissions for select:

  • Table user_info: allow access to id, name and city without any row conditions.
Column access for the role user
  • View user_private: allow access to id, phone, email and address if the user-id passed in the session variable is equal to the row’s user_id.
Column access for the role user based on row level permissions

Step 4: Query with appropriate access control

Now we can fetch the required data with the appropriate access control by using the relationship.

If the X-Hasura-Role and the X-Hasura-User-Id session variables are set to user and 2 respectively, we’ll get the following result:

query {
  user_info {
    id
    name
    city
    private_info {
      email
      phone
      address
    }
  }
}
query { user_info { id name city private_info { email phone address } } }
{ "data": { "user_info": [ { "id": 1, "name": "Julie", "city": "Boston", "private_info": null }, { "id": 2, "name": "Josh", "city": "Bangalore", "private_info": { "email": "josh@josh.com", "phone": "+91-9787675678", "address": "#141, 7th Main Road, Koramangala 3rd Block", } }, { "id": 3, "name": "John", "city": "Berlin", "private_info": null } ] } }

Observe that the private_info field is returned as null for all rows without the appropriate access.

Additional Resources

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