On Tue, 2006-03-14 at 16:41 -0600, Thomas F. O'Connell wrote:
> On Mar 4, 2006, at 3:56 AM, Simon Riggs wrote:
>
> > On Fri, 2006-03-03 at 12:03 -0600, Thomas F. O'Connell wrote:
> >> On Mar 3, 2006, at 11:54 AM, Simon Riggs wrote:
> >>
> >>> On Thu, 2006-03-02 at 16:38 -0600, Thomas F. O'Connell wrote:
> >>>> Ideally, I'd be able to take a base backup of a production system,
> >>>> copy it to a remote system, which is also the repository for
> >>>> segment
> >>>> files generated by archive_command, and complete the recovery
> >>>> process
> >>>> outlined in the docs. From that point, it would make sense to me
> >>>> that
> >>>> I should be able to continuously replay WAL files against the new
> >>>> database (possibly as soon as archive_command generates a new one)
> >>>> without having to purge my data directory. Is that a reasonable
> >>>> assumption?
> >>>
> >>> Yes, it was designed to be able to do this.
> >>
> >> From the docs, I'm having a hard time determining which steps to
> >> edit or omit in order to execute this scenario. Is it possible for
> >> you (or anyone else on the list) to present an extension of section
> >> 23.3.3 <http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.1/static/backup-
> >> online.html#BACKUP-PITR-RECOVERY> that covered the continuous replay
> >> scenario? I'd be happy to help contribute a patch to the docs once I
> >> understand the procedure a bit better.
> >
> > The place the primary backs up to is the place where the secondary
> > restores from, otherwise all procedures are as documented. Neither
> > system knows about the other, so its simpler than maybe you think.
> >
> > The only thing you need is the wait-for-next-file script.
>
> A few more questions in this thread:
>
> 1. With the wait-for-next-file script scenario, what happens with
> recovery.conf? Does it ever become recovery.done? What happens in the
> event of needing to recover? Does the script need a trigger to say,
> "Okay, stop waiting. We need to use what we have right now."?
Yes.
Everything you need is discussed in the admin archives.
> 2. Are there any salient details when performing an online backup
> from one machine to another? I'm assuming filesystem is an important
> consideration since the recovery process is not like the pg_dump
> recovery process. Any other gotchas?
No
Best Regards, Simon Riggs