> I've backed up my DB via 'pg_dump dbname' using no options. In order to > restore it via psql, do I first need to drop the db instance and recreate > it? > > Thanks in advance for your help. > > -Mike > > >
yes, you have to drop the original db, then use psql -f to restore it.
You don't have to drop it, you can create another db by any other name and re-run the sql file there. The only time you have to worry is if you use the -C (--create) option to pg_dump. This would actually issue a 'create database' command in the sql dump. But for you, you can restore to another database if you would like. That being said, if this is production, I would be careful to not 'accidentally' run the sql file against the wrong database, so for your own sanity, you may want to just drop the db. But there's no *requirement* that you do so.