Yes, StorageLocationPreparer looks like a useful plugin point in general...
and certainly helps with NHS in GCS.

Cheers,
Dmitri.

On Mon, Apr 20, 2026 at 7:26 PM Sung Yun <[email protected]> wrote:

> Thanks for driving this effort Varun,
>
> I think the new change introducing StorageLocationPreparer is an
> interesting idea. This would allow Polaris to check whether storage is
> ready before table creation, which is a feature gap today. I think it will
> work well with managed storage solutions that require some setup before
> data is written to the location.
>
> Cheers,
> Sung
>
> On 2026/04/20 18:51:32 Dmitri Bourlatchkov wrote:
> > Hi All,
> >
> > Heads up: we discussed this PR in the Community Sync last week. Please
> > review actual changes in GH and provide feedback.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Dmitri.
> >
> > On Thu, Apr 2, 2026 at 1:46 PM Dmitri Bourlatchkov <[email protected]>
> wrote:
> >
> > > HI Varun,
> > >
> > > Thanks for your contribution! I think it's quite timely as we have some
> > > recent user interest in the community [4106].
> > >
> > > Your design LGTM overall. I'll try to have a full review of the PR
> soon.
> > >
> > > Note for other reviewers: This feature involves a minor Polaris REST
> API
> > > change.
> > >
> > > Should the flag default to auto-detection in the future (e.g.,
> > >    checking if the bucket has HNS enabled at catalog creation time),
> or is
> > > an
> > >    explicit opt-in flag the right long-term approach?
> > >
> > >
> > > Auto-detection is a nice to have feature, but I'm not sure it's worth
> the
> > > added complexity on the Polaris side.
> > >
> > > I believe (admin) users are generally aware of the HNS state of the
> bucket
> > > they use for a catalog, so having a HNS flag in the Storage
> Configuration
> > > is probably not burdensome. At least this is quite acceptable for the
> > > initial PR. Note that Azure has a similar flag in its Storage
> Configuration
> > > [3347].
> > >
> > > This is just my personal opinion. If you feel like adding
> auto-detection
> > > in a follow-up PR, by all means please feel free to contribute that
> too.
> > >
> > > [3347] https://github.com/apache/polaris/pull/3347
> > >
> > > [4106] https://github.com/apache/polaris/pull/4106
> > >
> > > Cheers,
> > > Dmitri.
> > >
> > > On Thu, Apr 2, 2026 at 2:27 AM Varun Arya <[email protected]>
> wrote:
> > >
> > >> Hi Polaris community,
> > >> I'd like to start a discussion around a change I've been working on
> to add
> > >> support for GCS buckets with
> > >> https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/hns-overview enabled.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> *Problem*
> > >> When a GCS bucket has HNS enabled, folders must be created explicitly
> as
> > >> managed folders. The current credential vending logic only grants
> > >> `roles/storage.legacyObjectReader`,
> > >> `roles/storage.objectViewer`, and `roles/storage.legacyBucketWriter`
> which
> > >> is insufficient for HNS buckets. Operations that need to create
> folders
> > >> (e.g., Iceberg writing data/metadata) fail with 403 errors because the
> > >> downscoped token lacks `storage.managedFolders.create` permission.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> *Proposed Solution*
> > >> I've added a new optional hierarchicalNamespace boolean flag to
> > >> GcpStorageConfigInfo in the management API. When set to true, the
> > >> credential vending logic generates an additional access boundary rule
> > >> granting `roles/storage.folderAdmin` scoped to the specific write
> paths
> > >> using
> > >>
> resource.name.startsWith('projects/_/buckets/<bucket>/managedFolders/<path>')
> > >> conditions.
> > >>
> > >> *Key design decisions*:
> > >>
> > >>    1. Opt-in flag: HNS support is not enabled by default. Users must
> > >>    explicitly set hierarchicalNamespace: true in their catalog storage
> > >>    configuration. This avoids granting unnecessary permissions on
> non-HNS
> > >>    buckets.
> > >>    2. Least-privilege scoping: `roles/storage.folderAdmin` is the
> > >>    least-privileged predefined GCP role that includes
> > >>    storage.managedFolders.create. The access boundary condition
> expression
> > >>    limits scope to the specific write paths only.
> > >>    3. Write-path only: Folder management rules are only generated for
> > >> write
> > >>    locations. Read-only access does not get folderAdmin permissions.
> > >>    4. Multi-bucket support: The implementation handles cases where
> > >> metadata
> > >>    and data reside in separate buckets, generating correctly scoped
> > >>    folderAdmin rules for each.
> > >>
> > >> *Open Questions*
> > >>
> > >>    1. Should the flag default to auto-detection in the future (e.g.,
> > >>    checking if the bucket has HNS enabled at catalog creation time),
> or
> > >> is an
> > >>    explicit opt-in flag the right long-term approach?
> > >>
> > >> PR link: Enable HNS support for GCS
> > >> <https://github.com/apache/polaris/pull/3996>
> > >>
> > >> Thanks,
> > >> Varun Arya
> > >>
> > >
> >
>

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