On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 6:40 AM, Mark Kirkwood <
mark.kirkwood@catalyst.net.nz> wrote:
> On 09/07/14 05:13, Josh Berkus wrote:
>>> Another could be that during initdb all the uncommented settings be
>>>>
>>>> written to postgresql.auto.conf file rather than to postgresql.conf.
>>>> I think we can do this by changing code in initdb.c->setup_config().
>>>> This will ensure that unless user is changing settings in a mixed way
>>>> (some by Alter System and some manually by editing postgresql.conf),
>>>> there will no such problem.
>>
>>
>> There is no reasonable way for us to prevent issues for users who are
>> manually changing both pg.conf and pg.auto.conf. Users should stick to
>> one or the other method of management (or, thirdly, using conf.d); if
>> they mix methods, we can't prevent confusion at restart time and we
>> shouldn't try.
>
> Yes, but even well behaved users will see this type of error, because initdb uncomments certain values (ones that are dead certs for being changed via ALTER SYSTEM subsequently like shared_buffers), and then - bang! your next reload gets that "your postgresql.conf contains errors" message.
That is the reason, why I have suggested up-thread that uncommented
values should go to postgresql.auto.conf, that will avoid any such
observations for a well-behaved user.