Technology · Agentic → IAM · Open Source · wiki:deep

Cedar

Taxonomy

Cedar is an authorization policy language (and Rust engine) for writing and enforcing fine-grained permissions separately from application code. Applications authorize requests by calling Cedar’s evaluation engine against policies and entities (principals, actions, resources with attributes/parents). It targets RBAC/ABAC-style models, is designed for fast indexed evaluation, and supports schema validation plus automated-reasoning analysis. Use via the cedar-policy crate (cargo add cedar-policy), CLI, WASM, and language bindings (Go/Java, etc.). Apache-2.0.

RepoDocsStack: agentic-iam

Why it matters here

Agentic OS tools that change the world need allow/deny decisions that are declared, auditable, and not hardcoded in agents. Cedar is the research pick when you want an expressive, analyzable authorization language for app/API requests. Prefer OPA for general-purpose Rego across the stack (K8s, infra); prefer Keycloak for identity/SSO/user federation; prefer Earned Autonomy Protocol for methodology of earning execution scope, not a policy DSL.

How it works

Authors write permit/forbid policies and entity graphs; at request time the app supplies principal, action, resource, and Cedar returns ALLOW/DENY. Schemas enable validation; SymCC and related crates support property checking.

  1. Model entities and write Cedar policies.
  2. Embed cedar-policy (or CLI) in the service/agent gateway.
  3. On each sensitive request, authorize with policies + entities.
  4. Enforce the decision in the application — Cedar evaluates; the app enforces.

Related: earned-autonomy-protocol · keycloak · open-policy-agent · topics/13-governance-policy

Flow

Scroll inside the canvas to pan

When to reach for it

  • Use when: you need a dedicated authorization language with schema validation and analyzability for app/API permissions.
  • Skip when: you need IdP/SSO (keycloak), broad infra policy (opa), or governance methodology without an engine (earned-autonomy-protocol).
  • Prefer instead: OPA for CNCF-wide Rego enforcement; Keycloak for users/federation.

Limits

  • App must enforce: Cedar answers; failing to gate tools still leaks.
  • Rust/crate gravity: best native path is Rust; other SDKs exist but check maturity.
  • Not identity: no user store/SSO — pair with Keycloak (or similar) for who the principal is.
  • Not the ledger: policies ≠ company process authority by themselves.

Linked from

Catalog backlinks — what points here (wiki “what links here”).

Features

Stacks

Peers

Document management

What we checked

Claims below are backed by science sources on disk.

Founding / research paper

How We Built Cedar: A Verification-Guided Approach · STRONG

“This paper presents verification-guided development (VGD), a software engineering process we used to build Cedar, a new policy language for expressive, fast, safe, and analyzable authorization.”

Language / engine role

cedar-policy/cedar · MODERATE

“Implementation of the Cedar Policy Language”

Docs / usage

Cedar documentation · MODERATE

“Cedar is a language for writing authorization policies and making authorization decisions based on those policies.”

Contrast vs OPA

OPA contrast · MODERATE

“Open Policy Agent (OPA) is an open source, general-purpose policy engine that enables unified, context-aware policy enforcement across the entire stack.”

In this research stack

Features and peers linked from the catalog map — not a second product surface.

Features it supports

Same cell

Stack

Document management

Source

Primary repo github.com/cedar-policy/cedar · Open Source

technologies/cedar/README.md

Research inventory

9 tags · 46 out · 47 in · 3 artifacts · 0 gaps · 33 corpus docs

Catalog tags

landscape.layer
Agentic
landscape.subcategory
IAM
license_tag
Open Source
maps.dm
present
maps.features
8
one_liner
Agentic
review.depth
science
slug
cedar
title
Cedar

Artifacts

  • dm_map · present · technologies/cedar/document-management.md
  • features_map · present · technologies/cedar/features.md
  • readme · present · technologies/cedar/README.md

Out · alternative_to

Out · dm_axis

Out · maps_to

In · alternative_to

In · dm_axis

In · in_stack

In · maps_to

Corpus tags

category
Agentic → IAM
dedication
open-source
feature
access-vs-authority
agent-identity-interoperability
autonomy-levels
exception-first-participation
governance
r2-13-governance-policy
security-identity-governance
wt-human-policy
kind
map_edge
tech_features
tech_quote
tech_readme
tech_science_source
tech_section
needs_deepen
false
quality
ok
section
Document management map
Evidence
Features map
GitHub map
How it works
Limits & failure modes
Links
Scientific notes
What it is
When to use / skip
Why it matters here
slug
cedar
source_id
cedar-docs
cedar-github
opa-contrast
technology
cedar

Corpus documents (33)

map_edge · 8

  • cedar → access-vs-authority
  • cedar → agent-identity-interoperability
  • cedar → autonomy-levels
  • cedar → exception-first-participation
  • cedar → governance
  • cedar → r2-13-governance-policy
  • cedar → security-identity-governance
  • cedar → wt-human-policy

tech_features · 1

  • Cedar · features

tech_quote · 9

  • Cedar · cedar-docs
  • Cedar · cedar-docs
  • Cedar · cedar-docs
  • Cedar · cedar-github
  • Cedar · cedar-github
  • Cedar · cedar-github
  • Cedar · opa-contrast
  • Cedar · opa-contrast
  • … +1 more

tech_readme · 1

  • Cedar

tech_science_source · 3

  • Cedar · cedar-docs
  • Cedar · cedar-github
  • Cedar · opa-contrast

tech_section · 11

  • Cedar · Document management map
  • Cedar · Evidence
  • Cedar · Features map
  • Cedar · GitHub map
  • Cedar · How it works
  • Cedar · Limits & failure modes
  • Cedar · Links
  • Cedar · Scientific notes
  • … +3 more