This introduces a new hierarchical permission system that uses SQL queries
for efficient permission checking across resources. The system replaces the
older permission_allowed() pattern with a more flexible resource-based
approach.
Core changes:
- New Resource ABC and Action dataclass in datasette/permissions.py
* Resources represent hierarchical entities (instance, database, table)
* Each resource type implements resources_sql() to list all instances
* Actions define operations on resources with cascading rules
- New plugin hook: register_actions(datasette)
* Plugins register actions with their associated resource types
* Replaces register_permissions() and register_resource_types()
* See docs/plugin_hooks.rst for full documentation
- Three new Datasette methods for permission checks:
* allowed_resources(action, actor) - returns list[Resource]
* allowed_resources_with_reasons(action, actor) - for debugging
* allowed(action, resource, actor) - checks single resource
* All use SQL for filtering, never Python iteration
- New /-/tables endpoint (TablesView)
* Returns JSON list of tables user can view
* Supports ?q= parameter for regex filtering
* Format: {"matches": [{"name": "db/table", "url": "/db/table"}]}
* Respects all permission rules from configuration and plugins
- SQL-based permission evaluation (datasette/utils/actions_sql.py)
* Cascading rules: child-level → parent-level → global-level
* DENY beats ALLOW at same specificity
* Uses CTEs for efficient SQL-only filtering
* Combines permission_resources_sql() hook results
- Default actions in datasette/default_actions.py
* InstanceResource, DatabaseResource, TableResource, QueryResource
* Core actions: view-instance, view-database, view-table, etc.
- Fixed default_permissions.py to handle database-level allow blocks
* Now creates parent-level rules for view-table action
* Fixes: datasette ... -s databases.fixtures.allow.id root
Documentation:
- Comprehensive register_actions() hook documentation
- Detailed resources_sql() method explanation
- /-/tables endpoint documentation in docs/introspection.rst
- Deprecated register_permissions() with migration guide
Tests:
- tests/test_actions_sql.py: 7 tests for core permission API
- tests/test_tables_endpoint.py: 13 tests for /-/tables endpoint
- All 118 documentation tests pass
- Tests verify SQL does filtering (not Python)
🤖 Generated with [Claude Code](https://claude.com/claude-code)
Co-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>
