Received: from localhost (unknown [200.46.204.183]) by mail.postgresql.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 667B565038C for ; Tue, 4 Nov 2008 14:54:55 -0400 (AST) Received: from mail.postgresql.org ([200.46.204.86]) by localhost (mx1.hub.org [200.46.204.183]) (amavisd-maia, port 10024) with ESMTP id 90170-03 for ; Tue, 4 Nov 2008 14:54:55 -0400 (AST) X-Greylist: from auto-whitelisted by SQLgrey-1.7.6 Received: from sss.pgh.pa.us (sss.pgh.pa.us [66.207.139.130]) by mail.postgresql.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BF50765038A for ; Tue, 4 Nov 2008 14:54:54 -0400 (AST) Received: from sss2.sss.pgh.pa.us (tgl@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by sss.pgh.pa.us (8.14.2/8.14.2) with ESMTP id mA4IsqnT026116; Tue, 4 Nov 2008 13:54:52 -0500 (EST) To: "Scott Marlowe" cc: "Laszlo Nagy" , pgsql-admin@postgresql.org Subject: Re: rebellious postgres process In-reply-to: References: <490FFCF4.2050500@shopzeus.com> <16117.1225804625@sss.pgh.pa.us> <49106ED5.10805@shopzeus.com> <25929.1225824360@sss.pgh.pa.us> Comments: In-reply-to "Scott Marlowe" message dated "Tue, 04 Nov 2008 11:48:35 -0700" Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2008 13:54:52 -0500 Message-ID: <26115.1225824892@sss.pgh.pa.us> From: Tom Lane X-Archive-Number: 200811/29 X-Sequence-Number: 30683 "Scott Marlowe" writes: > On Tue, Nov 4, 2008 at 11:46 AM, Tom Lane wrote: >> Still, it's quite unclear how bad data read from the stats file could >> have led to an infinite loop. The stats file format is pretty "flat" >> and AFAICS the worst effect of undetected corruption would be to have >> wrong count values for some tables/databases. > True. Is it possible some other bit of the data in the system was > corrupted and freaking out the stats collector? The collector is pretty self-contained by design, so it's hard to see what else would affect it. I'm wondering a bit if the OP's hardware is still flaky :-(. In any case it would sure be interesting to see a few stack traces from the process. regards, tom lane