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Date: Wed, 16 May 2012 13:56:52 -0500
From: "ktm@rice.edu" <ktm@rice.edu>
To: David Schnur <dnschnur@gmail.com>
Cc: pgsql-admin@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: What does a .1 suffix on a PG data file signify?
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On Wed, May 16, 2012 at 02:52:44PM -0400, David Schnur wrote:
> I'm investigating a 'could not stat file' error that points to a file
> "base/16384/52212305.1".  All the data files I've ever seen have names that
> are whole numbers; I've never seen a decimal suffix.  It occurs to me that
> perhaps this is some kind of temp-file, or a system for avoiding duplicate
> file names, both of which might be relevant in the context of this error.
> 
> Can anyone confirm what the presence of the .1 suffix means?
> 
> I'm using Postgres 8.3.15 on Windows.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> David

Hi David,

Once you exceed the first 1GB of data for a file, a new file is
created with a .1 appended for the 2nd GB, and so on. For small
databases, you may never see a .1,.2,...

Regards,
Ken