Thread: reuse data in existing data directory
Dear PostGreSQL users, I have the following problem. I have a system with several partitions (openSuse Linux 11.1). Far what is important related to this question : - 1 system partition (where postgres is installed) - 1 data partition (where the postgres data directory is lying) my system partition got messed up and I prefer to reformat and reinstall the system without touching to the data partition. Thus I have to reinstall postgresql, but I don't know if I would be able to recover my data. Is that possible? How can I reintegrate all my ancient databases? Thanks in advance. -- Peter Schmidtke ---------------------- PhD Student at the Molecular Modeling and Bioinformatics Group Dep. Physical Chemistry Faculty of Pharmacy University of Barcelona
On 16/03/10 12:02, Peter Schmidtke wrote: > Dear PostGreSQL users, > > I have the following problem. I have a system with several partitions > (openSuse Linux 11.1). Far what is important related to this question : > > - 1 system partition (where postgres is installed) > - 1 data partition (where the postgres data directory is lying) > > my system partition got messed up and I prefer to reformat and reinstall > the system without touching to the data partition. Thus I have to reinstall > postgresql, but I don't know if I would be able to recover my data. Is that > possible? How can I reintegrate all my ancient databases? If the data partition contains *all* of your PostgreSQL data files (pg_clog, pg_xlog etc) then it should be simple enough. 1. Take a backup of your PG data (can't hurt). 2. Re-install SuSe, make sure you have the same version of PostgreSQL (if you had 8.3 before re-install that 8.3 again). 3. If your PG files are in the standard directory then you should see an error saying initdb refused to run. 4. That's it - it should all just work. -- Richard Huxton Archonet Ltd
Thanks Richard, in fact I just had to run the manual install of postgres and define the data directory to my existing one and everything was restored....great, but I preferred to ask rather than erasing my data ;) Thanks Peter On Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:24:41 +0000, Richard Huxton <dev@archonet.com> wrote: > On 16/03/10 12:02, Peter Schmidtke wrote: >> Dear PostGreSQL users, >> >> I have the following problem. I have a system with several partitions >> (openSuse Linux 11.1). Far what is important related to this question : >> >> - 1 system partition (where postgres is installed) >> - 1 data partition (where the postgres data directory is lying) >> >> my system partition got messed up and I prefer to reformat and reinstall >> the system without touching to the data partition. Thus I have to >> reinstall >> postgresql, but I don't know if I would be able to recover my data. Is >> that >> possible? How can I reintegrate all my ancient databases? > > If the data partition contains *all* of your PostgreSQL data files > (pg_clog, pg_xlog etc) then it should be simple enough. > > 1. Take a backup of your PG data (can't hurt). > 2. Re-install SuSe, make sure you have the same version of PostgreSQL > (if you had 8.3 before re-install that 8.3 again). > 3. If your PG files are in the standard directory then you should see an > error saying initdb refused to run. > 4. That's it - it should all just work. > > -- > Richard Huxton > Archonet Ltd -- Peter Schmidtke ---------------------- PhD Student at the Molecular Modeling and Bioinformatics Group Dep. Physical Chemistry Faculty of Pharmacy University of Barcelona