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Guide · Govern access

Govern access.

Aurelia controls who can read what with a model borrowed from Databricks Unity Catalog: access is granted as a principal has a privilege on a securable, and — when you turn it on — everything else is denied by default.

The namespace

Securables live in a three-level namespace, catalog.schema.table. Each workspace has one catalog, aurelia; schemas are data domains; tables are the gold marts your dashboards read.

SecurableDomainWhat it exposes
aurelia.marketing.channelMarketingChannel incrementality
aurelia.marketing.dailyMarketingDaily channel performance
aurelia.commerce.salesCommerceSales by region & category
aurelia.customers.cohortCustomersAcquisition cohorts & LTV

Principals & privileges

  • Privilege. Today the granted privilege is SELECT (read).
  • Member role. Grants target the member role — a Unity Catalog-style group. Every member inherits what the role is granted.
  • Owners. Workspace owners are implicit full-access admins (the metastore-admin analogue) and never need a grant.

Deny-by-default, opt-in

Governance is off until a workspace turns it on (owners, in settings). While it’s off, every member can read all data — nothing changes for existing workspaces.

When enabled, access flips to deny-by-default: a member can read a securable only if the member role has been granted SELECT on it. Dataset metadata (date bounds, filter members) stays readable either way, so filters and empty states keep working. The rule is enforced server-side wherever a dataset is served.

Order of checks: owner → always allowed · ungoverned metadata → always allowed · governance off → always allowed · otherwise the member role needs an explicit SELECT grant.

Managing grants

Open Settings → Data governance as an owner. Toggle enforcement on, then grant or revoke SELECT for the Member role on each securable. The matrix shows exactly what members can and can’t read, so you can review the before-and-after of any change.

On the roadmap

Documented and planned, not yet built:

  • Per-user and per-group principals, alongside the role.
  • MODIFY and other privileges beyond read.
  • Schema- and catalog-level grants with inheritance.
  • Row- and column-level masking.
  • Lineage and audit.

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