Re: 8.3.0 upgrade, confused by documentation

Tena Sakai wrote:
>
> Hi Chander,
>
> Thank you for your explanation.  I need a bit more
> information/de-confusion, though...
>
> I intend to follow the upgrade installation as much
> as I can.  Doing so, I have shut down the 8.2.4 (as
> shown in step 2) and renamed pgsql to pgsql.old (as
> shown in step 3).  How would I get the new (8.3.0)
> that I just installed via step 4 to dump the database
> that's not up?  And would I have done steps 5 through 7?
>
Okay.  I think that before shutting down 8.2.4, you needed to do a
pg_dumpall (using the 8.3 version of the tool) in order to get a backup
of the server.

The other alternative would be to start up the old version using the new
directory (pgdata.old) and then dump it.  However, the key here is that,
since pg_dumpall operates as a client application, you must have the
server up in order to dump the data.

Hope that helps..

Chander
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Tena Sakai
> tsakai@gallo.ucsf.edu
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chander Ganesan [mailto:chander@otg-nc.com]
> Sent: Mon 2/11/2008 11:47 AM
> To: Tena Sakai
> Cc: pgsql-admin@postgresql.org
> Subject: Re: [ADMIN] 8.3.0 upgrade, confused by documentation
>
> Tena Sakai wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> > I am going from 8.2.4 to 8.3.0.  Does, "For best results,
> > however, try to use the pg_dumpall command from PostgreSQL
> > 8.3.0" apply to me?  Doesn't this only apply if one is
> > already running 8.3.x?  (Even that is a bit strange, since
> > the last minor rev number is only 0 at this time...)
> >
> Yes.  You want to use the 8.3.0 version of pg_dumpall.  The latest
> version will understand the dump format required to import into the new
> version, and also will understand how to interact with the old version
> (8.2.4).  As such, using the new version of pg_dumpall is your best bet
> when upgrading.
>
> The old version (8.2.4) of pg_dumpall might not understand some of the
> new features, format methods, or optimizations required by the new
> version (8.3.0) - so you wouldn't want to restore a dump created with
> 8.2.4's pg_dumpall on a 8.3.0 server.
>
> Hope that makes sense.  Basically, the new version understands both the
> old and new version, but the old version only understands the old and
> older versions....  In many situations, you might see that it doesn't
> make a difference which version you use, but the reality is that there
> might be some special cases, etc. that the old version fails under -
> while the new version will not.
>
> Chander
> >
> >
> > Assuming I am wrong (ie., what it says does apply to me),
> > where in the steps (after 4 and before 8) do I make the
> > backup?
> >
> > I'd appreciate someone to de-confuse me.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Tena Sakai
> > tsakai@gallo.ucsf.edu
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> --
> Chander Ganesan
> Open Technology Group, Inc.
> One Copley Parkway, Suite 210
> Morrisville, NC  27560
> 919-463-0999/877-258-8987
> http://www.otg-nc.com
>
>


--
Chander Ganesan
Open Technology Group, Inc.
One Copley Parkway, Suite 210
Morrisville, NC  27560
919-463-0999/877-258-8987
http://www.otg-nc.com