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From: Michael Glaesemann <grzm@myrealbox.com>
Subject: Re: INSTALL file nits
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 2005 10:59:38 +0900
To: Rich Morin <rdm@cfcl.com>

Hello!

Not clear if you're new to PostgreSQL or not, but regardless, a warm  
welcome is extended.

On Sep 29, 2005, at 10:29 , Rich Morin wrote:

> I just grabbed a copy of PostgreSQL from
>
>   http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/unix_open_source/ 
> postgresql.html

Nifty! I didn't know Apple had a link there. And it's even a recent  
version!

> and installed it on my Mac OS X (Tiger; 10.4.2) machine.  I  
> followed the
> "Short Version" in the INSTALL file until I ran into problems, then  
> did
> some workarounds, as discussed below.

The short version is definitely that: short. It ceases to be short  
when one adds all of the caveats for all of the various systems and  
environments in which PostgreSQL will run.

> Perhaps this file should be made
> a bit more explicit or an INSTALL.OSX file could be generated...

One of the joys of open source is that the community can contribute,  
be that source code or documentation. (hint hint)

> adduser postgres
>     No such command.  I considered using System Preferences > Accounts
>     to add a user, but this seemed like a rather bogus approach, as it
>     would put a user in the Login dialog (unlike lp, postfix, ...).  I
>     found a (slightly dated) note from Apple, however, that suggested
>         just this approach, so I gave it a try.

To get around this, you can create a user using NetInfo  (or nicl or  
niutil at the command line) by copying another user, such as www.  
Make sure the userid is low (less than 100, iirc) and they will not  
appear in the login window, nor will a home folder be created. I use  
this technique for setting up a svn user on my machine (though I  
haven't done it yet for a postgres user).

Depending on your needs, you may want to bump up the shmmall and  
shmmax values in /etc/rc. They're quite small on a default Mac OS X  
install. I've needed to increase them if I'm running more than one  
installation of PostgreSQL on my box, or if I'm increasing the number  
of allowed connections to the server. With 2GB of available RAM, I  
allocated 256MB rather than the default 4MB. (I include the notes in  
the /etc/rc file so I remember what it was I did.)

Here are my settings
# original supplied with Mac OS X 10.4
# sysctl -w kern.sysv.shmmax=4194304 kern.sysv.shmmin=1  
kern.sysv.shmmni=32 kern.sysv.shmseg=8 kern.sysv.shmall=1024
# Defaults are for 4MB
# shmmax (4MB * 1024KB/MB * 1024 bytes/KB = 4194304 bytes)
# shmall (4MB @ 4K/page => 1024 pages)
# Increase to 256MB
# shmmax (256MB * 1024KB/MB * 1024 bytes/KB = 268435456)
# shmall (256MB @ 4K/page => 65536 pages)
sysctl -w kern.sysv.shmmax=268435456 kern.sysv.shmmin=1  
kern.sysv.shmmni=32 kern.sysv.shmseg=8 kern.sysv.shmall=65536

Don't know if this will be necessary for you, but thought you might  
like to know.

Michael Glaesemann
grzm myrealbox com