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III. Server Administration

This part covers topics that are of interest to a PostgreSQL database administrator. This includes installation of the software, set up and configuration of the server, management of users and databases, and maintenance tasks. Anyone who runs a PostgreSQL server, even for personal use, but especially in production, should be familiar with the topics covered in this part.

The information in this part is arranged approximately in the order in which a new user should read it. But the chapters are self-contained and can be read individually as desired. The information in this part is presented in a narrative fashion in topical units. Readers looking for a complete description of a particular command should see Part VI.

The first few chapters are written so they can be understood without prerequisite knowledge, so new users who need to set up their own server can begin their exploration with this part. The rest of this part is about tuning and management; that material assumes that the reader is familiar with the general use of the PostgreSQL database system. Readers are encouraged to look at Part I and Part II for additional information.

Table of Contents
15. Installation from Source Code
15.1. Short Version
15.2. Requirements
15.3. Getting The Source
15.4. Upgrading
15.5. Installation Procedure
15.6. Post-Installation Setup
15.7. Supported Platforms
15.8. Platform-Specific Notes
16. Installation from Source Code on Windows
16.1. Building with Visual C++ or the Platform SDK
16.2. Building libpq with Visual C++ or Borland C++
17. Server Setup and Operation
17.1. The PostgreSQL User Account
17.2. Creating a Database Cluster
17.3. Starting the Database Server
17.4. Managing Kernel Resources
17.5. Shutting Down the Server
17.6. Preventing Server Spoofing
17.7. Encryption Options
17.8. Secure TCP/IP Connections with SSL
17.9. Secure TCP/IP Connections with SSH Tunnels
18. Server Configuration
18.1. Setting Parameters
18.2. File Locations
18.3. Connections and Authentication
18.4. Resource Consumption
18.5. Write Ahead Log
18.6. Query Planning
18.7. Error Reporting and Logging
18.8. Run-Time Statistics
18.9. Automatic Vacuuming
18.10. Client Connection Defaults
18.11. Lock Management
18.12. Version and Platform Compatibility
18.13. Preset Options
18.14. Customized Options
18.15. Developer Options
18.16. Short Options
19. Client Authentication
19.1. The pg_hba.conf file
19.2. User name maps
19.3. Authentication methods
19.4. Authentication problems
20. Database Roles and Privileges
20.1. Database Roles
20.2. Role Attributes
20.3. Privileges
20.4. Role Membership
20.5. Function and Trigger Security
21. Managing Databases
21.1. Overview
21.2. Creating a Database
21.3. Template Databases
21.4. Database Configuration
21.5. Destroying a Database
21.6. Tablespaces
22. Localization
22.1. Locale Support
22.2. Character Set Support
23. Routine Database Maintenance Tasks
23.1. Routine Vacuuming
23.2. Routine Reindexing
23.3. Log File Maintenance
24. Backup and Restore
24.1. SQL Dump
24.2. File System Level Backup
24.3. Continuous Archiving and Point-In-Time Recovery (PITR)
24.4. Migration Between Releases
25. High Availability, Load Balancing, and Replication
25.1. Comparison of different solutions
25.2. Log-Shipping Standby Servers
25.3. Failover
25.4. Alternative method for log shipping
25.5. Hot Standby
26. Recovery Configuration
26.1. Archive recovery settings
26.2. Recovery target settings
26.3. Standby server settings
27. Monitoring Database Activity
27.1. Standard Unix Tools
27.2. The Statistics Collector
27.3. Viewing Locks
27.4. Dynamic Tracing
28. Monitoring Disk Usage
28.1. Determining Disk Usage
28.2. Disk Full Failure
29. Reliability and the Write-Ahead Log
29.1. Reliability
29.2. Write-Ahead Logging (WAL)
29.3. Asynchronous Commit
29.4. WAL Configuration
29.5. WAL Internals
30. Regression Tests
30.1. Running the Tests
30.2. Test Evaluation
30.3. Variant Comparison Files
30.4. Test Coverage Examination