What PGPASS_FILE should be set to?

[ratijas]

Documentation for PGPASS_FILE says:

Default: <null> This varible should be set to if you want to pass password using pgpass file for the servers added in pgadmin.

Besides the "varible" typo, what should it be set to? To whatever anything like PGADMIN_DISABLE_POSTFIX, or to a file path like PGADMIN_SERVER_JSON_FILE?

And if to a file path, then why is it not defaulting to ~/.pgpass like the original psql does?

What's even the HOME ~ inside the container? I checked it, and apparently

• current directory is /pgadmin4,
• user is pgadmin
• $HOME points to /home/pgadmin, but even /home does not exist.

[ratijas]

entrypoint.sh:

    # Copy the pgpass file passed using secrets
    if [ -n "${PGPASS_FILE}" ] && [ -f "${PGPASS_FILE}" ]; then
        if [ "${PGADMIN_CONFIG_SERVER_MODE}" = "False" ]; then
            cp "${PGPASS_FILE}" /var/lib/pgadmin/.pgpass
            chmod 600 /var/lib/pgadmin/.pgpass

So, we used docker/podman secrets to mount a password file which wouldn't persist anywhere outside of secrets storage,

and pgAdmin just plainly copies it to its directory?

Apparently, it also only works on a first run:

external_config_db_exists=$(...scripting scripting scripting...)
if [ ! -f /var/lib/pgadmin/pgadmin4.db ] && [ "${external_config_db_exists}" = "False" ]; then

so if you introduce this file later, it would simply NOT work at all.

And what is this undocumented $PGADMIN_CONFIG_SERVER_MODE environment variable that stands in the way?