Documentation of the second database platform, including two gaps found while writing it.

What this covers

A small number of services need a different kind of database from the rest, and that platform is now documented alongside the others — how it is set up, how accounts and permissions are managed, and what happens when something fails.

Two gaps, written down rather than quietly noted

Neither database currently has a proper backup beyond a periodic copy of its disk, which means recovering from a mistake could lose several hours of changes. And of the two, only one encrypts its connections.

Both are recorded openly with the steps to fix them, and both are scheduled. Neither is reachable from outside the platform.

Something done well, for once worth naming

On this platform every account and permission is written down and applied automatically, rather than typed in by hand — which makes it possible to answer "who can read this?" by reading a file instead of asking the database.