PolyBase - user pdw_user

Whom or what is the Hadoop user pdw_user?

If you have started to use PolyBase to connect to your Hadoop installation, you may have noticed that the user name pdw_user shows up when you insert records back to Hadoop from PolyBase.  You find this value in the database DWConfiguration:

       
    SELECT * FROM [DWConfiguration].[dbo].[configuration_properties]
      where [key] = 'HadoopUserName';
       
 

Which returns:

id	key	value	default	protection	access	datatype
Hadoop	HadoopUserName	NULL	pdw_user	0	0	string

There is little documentation, so its best not to make a change to this, or other values in the tables.