Metabase UI Visibility Depends on pg_catalog Permissions in RisingWave

[rmbeddor14]

TL;DR if you can't see the MVs in the metabase UI, change your connecting user's permissions

• I connected to metabase with a user that just had full db access (had query, create, connect access for all tables and all mvs in a db) , but did not have information_schema, pg_catalog, rw_catalog access.
• as a result, I could send queries in metabase through sql, but I couldn't use the UI features that enable me to view the table/ mv as a "table" in the UI.
• after giving myself super permissions, I was able to see the MVs in the metabase UI. ALTER USER user_name WITH SUPERUSER;
• so basically, if you can't see the MVs in the metabase UI, change your connecting user's permissions
• make sure your connecting user has information_schema db access

here's the query that metabase sends risingwave to poll the schema (and subsequently create the clickable "tables" that you can use in the UI):

SELECT
    nspname AS "TABLE_SCHEM",
    current_database() AS "TABLE_CATALOG"
FROM pg_catalog.pg_namespace
WHERE
    nspname <> 'pg_toast'
    AND (
        nspname !~ '^pg_temp_'
        OR nspname = (pg_catalog.current_schemas(true))[1]
    )
    AND (
        nspname !~ '^pg_toast_temp_'
        OR nspname = REPLACE(
            (pg_catalog.current_schemas(true))[1],
            'pg_temp_',
            'pg_toast_temp_'
        )
    )
ORDER BY
    "TABLE_SCHEM";

• If your user can't access this info because they don't have access to this catalog/ tables, then you subsequently cannot see the the MVs as clickable tables in the UI

• issues like this will be easier to observe when RisingWave has a visible and easy-to-use query log and easier to use permissions

• we are posting this here to improve visibility in our RunLLM context so that when users query RunLLM with relevant questions they can see the answer