Database setup · Ontave

Separate owner and runtime access

Use a dedicated PostgreSQL 18 database. Migrations need an authorized owner/operator connection; application queries use a different non-owner login without superuser or BYPASSRLS privileges.

For a local development database, an administrator can create the runtime role interactively:

CREATE ROLE ontave_runtime LOGIN NOSUPERUSER NOBYPASSRLS;
\password ontave_runtime

Use your database operator's credential workflow for managed PostgreSQL. Keep passwords in private environment or libpq configuration rather than command history. Do not reuse an unrelated application database.

Apply explicit internal migrations

import { Pool } from "pg";
import { migrate, migrationPlan } from "ontave/postgres";

const admin = new Pool({
  connectionString: process.env.ONTAVE_MIGRATION_DATABASE_URL,
});
try {
  console.log(await migrationPlan(admin));
  await migrate(admin, "ontave_runtime");
} finally {
  await admin.end();
}

Run this on the intended dedicated database as an explicit operator step. Runtime construction never runs migrations automatically.

Ledger and grants

Migrations use an advisory transaction lock and verify applied checksums before running pending SQL. Pending internal DDL and ledger changes commit together. A checksum mismatch requires investigation against the exact installed artifact; do not edit the ledger to conceal it.

The migration grants the selected runtime role the required scoped operations. Immutable evidence and history cannot be rewritten through the runtime role. Row-level security is forced on workspace tables, with workspace-aware foreign keys.

Provision explicitly

Migrations do not create a global business workspace or seed. Call workspaces.create with trusted provisioning capability and choose empty or people. Register an explicit application contract before querying records.