From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
To: Greg Williamson <gwilliamson39@yahoo.com>
cc: "pgsql-admin@postgresql.org" <pgsql-admin@postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: Database size stays constant but disk space keeps shrinking --
	postgres 9.1
In-reply-to: <1348797684.2846.YahooMailNeo@web125904.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>
References: <1348783559.78739.YahooMailNeo@web125906.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>
	<5064D7BC.1000709@pinpointresearch.com>
	<1348797684.2846.YahooMailNeo@web125904.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>
Comments: In-reply-to Greg Williamson <gwilliamson39@yahoo.com>
	message dated "Thu, 27 Sep 2012 19:01:24 -0700"
Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2012 22:14:39 -0400
Message-ID: <10417.1348798479@sss.pgh.pa.us>

Greg Williamson <gwilliamson39@yahoo.com> writes:
>> Have you checked to see if there are any processes that have open handles to
>> deleted files (lsof -X | grep deleted).

> lsof -X | grep deleted | wc -l

> shows: 835 such files.

> A couple:
> postgres   2540 postgres   50u      REG                8,3     409600      93429 /var/lib/postgresql/9.1/main/base/2789
> 200/11816 (deleted)
> postgres   2540 postgres   51u      REG                8,3   18112512   49694570 /var/lib/postgresql/9.1/main/base/2789
> 200/2791679 (deleted)
> <...>

So, which processes are holding these open, and what are they doing
exactly?  Let's see output from ps and pg_stat_activity, maybe even
attach to them with gdb and get stack traces.

> We've a planned restart scheduled soon which will let me find any
> scripts that might be keeping things open,

A restart will destroy all the evidence, so let's not be in a hurry
to do that before we've identified what's happening.

			regards, tom lane