So if the wal filesystem is 100% full, can you actually startup postgres in archiving mode (so the archive process can resume copying)? Presumably postgres will try to write to the wal filesystem when you start it, and fail due to the filesystem full and then just shutdown/abort? Wouldnt you have to free some space in the wal filesystem in order to get postgres up and running?
Thanks for you help.
> Date: Mon, 23 Aug 2010 17:41:59 -0500 > From: Kevin.Grittner@wicourts.gov > To: kierenscott@hotmail.com; pgsql-admin@postgresql.org > Subject: Re: [ADMIN] WAL and archive disks full > > Kieren Scott <kierenscott@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > Sorry it's a bit of a what-if scenario. I can envisage > > encountering a situation in the future whereby we hit this > > problem, and I was trying to put a plan in place for how to deal > > with it. > > Oh, OK. I was afraid you had actually *hit* this situation and were > being coy. No need to apologize for contingency planning! :-) > > Hypothetically, in the situation where the stall originated with the > application of files from the archive, fixing that end would and > clearing files from the archive directory (or moving or deleting old > ones if they were applying cleanly and just sitting there after > application), would allow the archive process to resume copying and > cleaning up files on the source database. > > If someone panicked and deleted files from the pg_xlog directory, > well, the first thing is to try to make sure nobody does that. You > might be able to turn off archiving and get the server to come up. > If not, start by making a complete copy of your data directory and > all of its subdirectories while PostgreSQL is stopped, because you > may wander into trouble and want to try again. If you can't start > with archiving turned off, you might want to look at this: > > http://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/interactive/app-pgresetxlog.html > > Of course, you want to monitor closely to ensure your backups are > running correctly so you never need any of the above advice. ;-) > > -Kevin > > -- > Sent via pgsql-admin mailing list (pgsql-admin@postgresql.org) > To make changes to your subscription: > http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-admin