Comments on: psql: FATAL: Ident authentication failed for user "username" Error and Solution

By: ciotog

ciotog — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 13:35:10 +0000

Felicia is exactly right, following this article is a potential security risk for your database. Use with caution!

By: Nathan

Nathan — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 04:31:12 +0000

Why restart the service and kick everyone out? Just reload the config file via:

pg_ctl reload

By: umpirsky

umpirsky — Wed, 25 May 2011 18:49:56 +0000

Make sure to put in password instead trusted, and check top line, it usually have separate line for default user. Check config twice!

By: Rossg

Rossg — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 00:42:46 +0000

If you are on Ubuntu it will be /etc/postgres/8.4/main/pg_dba.conf

By: Ramanathan

Ramanathan — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 15:26:23 +0000

Hi Paul,

If you had installed pgsql using *.bin file. it will be installed in /opt/Postgres/* by default. I think this file will be in /opt/P***/8.4/data/. Better you find this file uinsg “find ./ -name pg_hba.conf” in installed location.

thanks Ramanathan

By: paul

paul — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 11:58:55 +0000

I’m using postgresql version 8.4.5. I dont have /var/lib/pgsql/data/pg_hba.conf file. where is file located in this version?

By: Rod McLaughlin

Rod McLaughlin — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 23:58:18 +0000

I found the file at /etc/postgresql/8.4/main/pg_hba.conf
I had to comment out most of the lines:
# local all all ident
# host all all 127.0.0.1/32 md5
# host all all ::1/128 md5
and add:
local all all trust
host all all 127.0.0.1/32 trust
at the bottom of pg_hba.conf

save,
sudo su – postgres
service postgresql restart
then I could do stuff (Rails 3 with RSpec)

By: Anthalamus

Anthalamus — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 14:55:13 +0000

worked like a charm thanks!

By: Anand

Anand — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 08:42:12 +0000

Thanks, its worked for me. Saved my time.

By: felicia

felicia — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 19:36:24 +0000

trust means to allow with no password. The command in the example will prompt for a password, but hitting enter will get you right in. You might want to use “password” instead of “trust.” See http://developer.postgresql.org/pgdocs/postgres/auth-pg-hba-conf.html.

By: aaxc

aaxc — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 06:28:32 +0000

hmm… this is not working for me … any other ideas?

By: lamachine

lamachine — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 22:09:25 +0000

@Vivek Gite
Your description is causing an error:
FATAL: missing or erroneous pg_hba.conf file
this is coming from missing column:
host all 127.0.0.1/32 trust
Here is what the working line looks like
host all all 127.0.0.1/32 trust

By: kangu

kangu — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:49:16 +0000

Thanks saved one life here!

By: Saeed

Saeed — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:05:37 +0000

Thank You! saved me once :-)

By: Anibal Leite

Anibal Leite — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:55:44 +0000

Tank you!

By: Wladek

Wladek — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 19:50:39 +0000

Hi, I have the same problem. I’ve created a program in perl, which contains connector to database DBI, and driver DBD::Pg. But I have still the same answer Fatal: Ident Authetification failed for user postgres…
this is the connector:
my $dbh = DBI->connect(“DBI:Pg:dbname=test;host=localhost”, “postgres”, “”, {‘RaiseError’ => 1});

please help…

By: Camitux

Camitux — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 03:04:54 +0000

Hey
Tanks

By: himanshu

himanshu — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 12:18:35 +0000

Hi, its very urgent.
I m continuously getting below error, while running JSP file in jakarta-tomcat.
PSQLException: FATAL: Ident authentication failed for user “root”

I am trying to connect to a database ‘bedrock’. I am able to login & see the DB by ‘psql -d bedrock -U root’ from cmd-prompt. But the same does not happen from JSP file. Why is it so?? Please help me, its been 5 days struggling like mads……….

By: andrew toth

andrew toth — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 21:36:40 +0000

I did the modifications, and get an error message (pg version 8.3):
psql: FATAL: missing or erroneous pg_hba.conf file
HINT: See server log for details.