Supabase Alpha July 2020

Summary

Supabase announced the release of Supabase Auth following five months of development, providing resources and a video tutorial on implementing authentication with PostgreSQL Row Level Security. The Table Editor now allows users to drill multiple levels deep into table relationships as well as add, delete, and download rows directly. Newly created projects also include access to additional Postgres extensions, including pgsql-http, pgjwt, plpgsql_check, and pljava. Further platform updates include an or filter in the client library, expanded capabilities for the postgres-meta REST management server, and persistence for open tabs in the Table View. Additionally, the auto-generated documentation now integrates authentication guides, and visual page transition glitches have been resolved.

Context

After five months of building, Supabase sought to streamline application authentication setup and enhance database data manipulation tools for users.

Approach / What changed

The release introduces Supabase Auth with Row Level Security guidance, updates the Table Editor to support multi-level relationship drilling and row manipulation, and adds extensions like pgsql-http and pgjwt to new projects.

Takeaways

• Supabase Auth allows developers to implement authentication systems utilizing PostgreSQL Row Level Security.
• The Table Editor supports multi-level relationship drill-downs along with capabilities to add, delete, and download table rows.
• New Supabase projects include PostgreSQL extensions pgsql-http for in-database HTTP requests, pgjwt for JSON Web Tokens, plpgsql_check for linting, and pljava for Java stored procedures.

Related reading

• Supabase · Jul 1, 2020

  Supabase Alpha June 2020

  Four months into development, Supabase released its June 2020 alpha update focused on simplifying PostgreSQL management and eliminating regional performance bottlenecks. The release introduces a spreadsheet-like interface for drilling down into relational tables alongside automated detection and editing support for JSON and JSONB columns. To address latency issues previously caused by hosting all projects exclusively in Singapore, the platform now allows developers to select specific database regions. In line with its zero lock-in principle, Supabase exposed daily backups on the dashboard and enhanced the SQL editor with improved syntax highlighting. The team also expanded by hiring PostgREST maintainer Steve Chavez while continuing efforts toward future multi-region replication and WAL-G backup integration.

  Paul Copplestone

• Supabase · Aug 5, 2020

  Supabase Auth

  Following an early community launch on Hacker News, the open-source Firebase alternative Supabase faced heavy developer demand for a dedicated authentication and authorization solution. In response, the team evaluated existing open-source tools such as KeyCloak and Kratos before landing on an architecture combining a forked Netlify GoTrue server with PostgreSQL and PostgREST. The resulting Supabase Auth system provides client methods like signUp and signIn alongside authorization powered by PostgreSQL Row Level Security and policies. By leveraging SQL policies to enforce access rules directly in the database, developers avoid repetitive middleware filtering while maintaining granular access controls. Future roadmap plans include adding third-party OAuth providers, custom email templates, and simplified policy management interfaces for non-technical users.