Thread: xlog flush request is not satisfied error

Hello

I've did pg_dumpall of a number of databases on 7.4.2 install of
PostgreSQL then imported that into another 7.4.2 install. This is on
Debian Sid, every 5 hours, there's a script
/usr/lib/postgresql/bin/do.maintenance which runs on the database,
VACUUMing it and such. The next time that script ran, I got the
following errors:

ERROR:  xlog flush request 0/E25BA1C4 is not satisfied --- flushed only to 0/841D994
CONTEXT:  writing block 1 of relation 17143/370747
\connect: FATAL:  xlog flush request 0/E25BC218 is not satisfied --- flushed only to 0/841D994
CONTEXT:  writing block 1 of relation 17143/370749

At that point, it was still running, but due to a misconfiguration,
wasn't logging anything. So, I thought I should restart it with logging.
It failed to start:

2004-04-19 08:41:15 [3841] LOG:  database system shutdown was interrupted at 2004-04-19 08:41:13 EEST
2004-04-19 08:41:15 [3841] LOG:  checkpoint record is at 0/789AE1C
2004-04-19 08:41:15 [3841] LOG:  redo record is at 0/789AE1C; undo record is at 0/0; shutdown FALSE
2004-04-19 08:41:15 [3841] LOG:  next transaction ID: 3711; next OID: 610488
2004-04-19 08:41:15 [3841] LOG:  database system was not properly shut down; automatic recovery in progress
2004-04-19 08:41:15 [3841] LOG:  redo starts at 0/789AE5C
2004-04-19 08:41:19 [3841] PANIC:  heap_delete_redo: no block
2004-04-19 08:41:19 [3835] LOG:  startup process (PID 3841) was terminated by signal 6
2004-04-19 08:41:19 [3835] LOG:  aborting startup due to startup process failure

Subsequent attempts to start it generate:

2004-04-19 08:48:18 [3921] LOG:  database system was interrupted while in recovery at 2004-04-19 08:41:15 EEST
HINT:  This probably means that some data is corrupted and you will have to use the last backup for recovery.
2004-04-19 08:48:18 [3921] LOG:  checkpoint record is at 0/789AE1C
...

While the data is irrelevant (I can get that from the dump), this could
be a bug in PostgreSQL, or whatnot, so I'm asking here if anyone has any
ideas what I can do to that.

--
George Cristian Birzan            gcbirzan (at) wolfheart (dot) ro
I respect faith, but doubt is what gives you an education.    -- Wilson Mizner

George Cristian Birzan <gcbirzan@wolfheart.ro> writes:
> ERROR:  xlog flush request 0/E25BA1C4 is not satisfied --- flushed only to =
> 0/841D994
> CONTEXT:  writing block 1 of relation 17143/370747

> While the data is irrelevant (I can get that from the dump), this could
> be a bug in PostgreSQL, or whatnot, so I'm asking here if anyone has any
> ideas what I can do to that.

Run some hardware diagnostics.  This looks like your disk drive dropped
some bits ...
        regards, tom lane

On Mon, Apr 19, 2004 at 09:53:26AM -0400, Tom Lane wrote:
> Run some hardware diagnostics.  This looks like your disk drive dropped
> some bits ...

That would be something, it would be the second disk in two weeks. It's
a brand new drive and I haven't had any other problems. (Heck, even the
other PostgreSQL installation, the one I got the dump from, is running
on that drive).
Though, yes, it would be an indication of a problem elsewhere, if that's
the case.
--
George Cristian Birzan            gcbirzan (at) wolfheart (dot) ro
I'm tired of all this nonsense about beauty being only skin-deep. That's
deep enough. What do you want, an adorable pancreas?    -- Jean Kerr