To: Chris <ctlajoie@gmail.com>
cc: pgsql-performance@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: How to troubleshoot high mem usage by postgres? 
In-reply-to: <57033cf81002271525w3bddc0acn63a5fd3f649068d4@mail.gmail.com> 
References: <57033cf81002271429wb0da13am37b3cb6258103ea5@mail.gmail.com>
	<B7ED361D-6F31-4E15-A814-C8293D51C852@silentmedia.com>
	<57033cf81002271525w3bddc0acn63a5fd3f649068d4@mail.gmail.com>
Comments: In-reply-to Chris <ctlajoie@gmail.com>
	message dated "Sat, 27 Feb 2010 16:25:26 -0700"
Date: Sun, 28 Feb 2010 11:42:39 -0500
Message-ID: <9487.1267375359@sss.pgh.pa.us>
From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>

Chris <ctlajoie@gmail.com> writes:
> @Tom Lane:
> As I mentioned above I am not doing everything in a single
> transaction. However I do want to try your suggestion regarding
> getting a "memory context map". But I'm afraid I don't know how to do
> what you are describing. How can I set the ulimit of postmaster?

Depends on the script you are using to start the postmaster.  One way is
to call ulimit in the startup script right before it invokes the
postmaster.  However, if you have something like

	su - postgres -c "postmaster ..."

then I'd try putting it in the postgres user's ~/.profile or
~/.bash_profile instead; the su is likely to reset such things.

> And
> does the postmaster stderr output go to the postgres log file?

Also depends.  Look at the startup script and see where it redirects
postmaster's stderr to.  You might have to modify the script --- some
are known to send stderr to /dev/null :-(

Sorry to be so vague, but different packagers have different ideas
about how to do this.

			regards, tom lane