Subject: Re: base backup client as auxiliary backend process
To: Alexandra Wang <lewang@pivotal.io>
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Cc: Sergei Kornilov <sk@zsrv.org>, Michael Paquier <michael@paquier.xyz>,
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From: Peter Eisentraut <peter.eisentraut@2ndquadrant.com>
Organization: 2ndQuadrant
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Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2020 16:20:35 +0100
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On 2020-01-09 11:57, Alexandra Wang wrote:
> Back to the base backup stuff, I don't quite understand all the benefits you
> mentioned above. It seems to me the greatest benefit with this patch is that
> postmaster takes care of pg_basebackup itself, which reduces the human 
> wait in
> between running the pg_basebackup and pg_ctl/postgres commands. Is that 
> right?
> I personally don't mind the --write-recovery-conf option because it helps me
> write the primary_conninfo and primary_slot_name gucs into
> postgresql.auto.conf, which to me as a developer is easier than editing
> postgres.conf without automation.  Sorry about the dumb question but 
> what's so
> bad about --write-recovery-conf?

Making it easier to automate is one major appeal of my proposal.  The 
current way of setting up a standby is very difficult to automate correctly.

> Are you planning to completely replace
> pg_basebackup with this? Is there any use case that a user just need a
> basebackup but not immediately start the backend process?

I'm not planning to replace or change pg_basebackup.

-- 
Peter Eisentraut              http://www.2ndQuadrant.com/
PostgreSQL Development, 24x7 Support, Remote DBA, Training & Services