Thread: Strange behaviour with Xfs filesystem and unix_socket_directory

We configured the unix_socket_directory in postgresql.conf to point to a
folder in a xfs filesystem.

The problem is that pg_ctl tries to start the daemon but after 1 minute
it gives up with the following message: could not start postmaster.

The strange thing is that the postmaster is there, up and alive...

Moreover this does not happen with other filesystems...

Any idea?

We're running 8.1.9 on Linux Ubuntu with kernel 2.6.17-11 and xfs progs
2.8.10-1

Thank you in advance for your help,

Denis

Denis Gasparin <denis@edistar.com> writes:
> We configured the unix_socket_directory in postgresql.conf to point to a
> folder in a xfs filesystem.

I don't think pg_ctl can deal with nondefault settings of
unix_socket_directory, because it does not make any attempt to parse the
postmaster's postgresql.conf file.  So it's still trying to contact the
postmaster in /tmp, and of course not seeing any evidence the postmaster
is up.

You'll find that most other clients fail similarly.

You might be able to make it work if you set PGHOST to the socket
directory before running pg_ctl (and other clients).  But I think
if you really want this, you would be best advised to alter the default
socket directory at build time, instead (see DEFAULT_PGSOCKET_DIR in
pg_config_manual.h).

            regards, tom lane

Setting PGHOST solved the problem!

It was not clear to me that pg_ctl is actually a client and it doesn't read the configuration from postgresql.conf

Thank you,
Denis

Tom Lane ha scritto:

Denis Gasparin <denis@edistar.com> writes: 

We configured the unix_socket_directory in postgresql.conf to point to a
folder in a xfs filesystem.   

I don't think pg_ctl can deal with nondefault settings of
unix_socket_directory, because it does not make any attempt to parse the
postmaster's postgresql.conf file.  So it's still trying to contact the
postmaster in /tmp, and of course not seeing any evidence the postmaster
is up.

You'll find that most other clients fail similarly.

You might be able to make it work if you set PGHOST to the socket
directory before running pg_ctl (and other clients).  But I think
if you really want this, you would be best advised to alter the default
socket directory at build time, instead (see DEFAULT_PGSOCKET_DIR in
pg_config_manual.h).
		regards, tom lane

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