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Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 12:49:55 +0200
From: =?iso-8859-1?Q?=22Martin_M=FCnstermann=22?= <mmuenst@gmx.de>
In-Reply-To: <20100329101857.GC1188@ismet.erje.net>
Message-ID: <20100329104955.222110@gmx.net>
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References: <20100329093134.62810@gmx.net>
	<20100329101857.GC1188@ismet.erje.net>
Subject: Re: Migration of PGDATA
To: Robert Joosten <robert@ml.erje.net>, pgsql-admin@postgresql.org
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Hi,

> > is it safe to move the PGDATA directory from one system to another when
> migrating from one operating system to another?
> > For example: migrating from Debian to RHEL, or from RHEL4 to RHEL5?
> > The database is of course shutdown properly, and the PG major versions
> match.
> > Or is a dump/restore necessary in these cases?
> 
> Besides the other reply, take into account little- versus bigendian 
> changes if you switch hardware.

Good point. But as we stick to Linux on Intel, we expect no problems there.

> But just out of curiosity: why propose against a dump/restore ? I mean: 
> when I upgrade between major releases I dump as well, as it is 
> recommended. I never ran into trouble, you know. 

It's a question of migration duration aka downtime.
Our PGDATA resides on a SAN, so moving/migrating the directory takes a couple of seconds. A dump/restore cycle would take much longer.

Thanks,
 Martin

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