Re: Recovering data from an old disk image

On 07/15/2016 08:37 AM, Richard Kuhns wrote:
> Greetings,
>
> I need to recover some data from a disk image that was attached to a
> virtual machine that has since been deleted.
>
> I'm 99.9% sure that postgres was stopped normally before this image was
> saved. Everything was supposed to have been migrated as part of an
> upgrade, but it seems that at least one of the original tables didn't
> get moved. I've been asked to recover it.
>
> It was apparently decided that there was no reason to save the output of
> the pg_dump that was used for the upgrade, since they saved the original
> pgsql data directory.
>
> I've copied the entire pgsql directory to a new machine & installed the
> most recent 9.3 to try to read it. When I start the server it tells me
> that the database was initialized by version 9.4, so it can't handle it.
>
> I uninstalled 9.3 & installed the most recent 9.4. When I try to start
> it, it tells me:
>
> postgres[99770]: [1-1] FATAL: database files are incompatible with server
> postgres[99770]: [1-2] DETAIL: The database cluster was initialized
> with PG_CONTROL_VERSION 937, but the server was compiled with
> PG_CONTROL_VERSION 942.
>
> Based on a search of the mailing list archives I'm guessing that the
> original postgresql server was a 9.4 beta.
>
> I'd greatly appreciate any help in recovering this database. If anyone
> can tell me how to find the postgresql source to the 9.4 version that
> used PG_CONTROL_VERSION 937 that would be wonderful. If there's a
> simpler way to get at the data that would be even better.

https://git.postgresql.org/gitweb/?p=postgresql.git;a=blob;f=src/include/catalog/pg_control.h;h=05c5b748cb9a780d2f938cc1ca1d8ae4d7df1bbb;hb=e6df2e1be6330660ba4d81daa726ae4a71535aa9

So:

REL9_4_BETA1

https://git.postgresql.org/gitweb/?p=postgresql.git;a=tags

>
> Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> --
> Richard Kuhns <rjk(at)wintek(dot)com>
> Wintek Corporation
> 427 N 6th Street
> Lafayette, IN 47901-2211
>
> Main: 765-742-8428
> Direct: 765-269-8541
>
>

--
Adrian Klaver
adrian(dot)klaver(at)aklaver(dot)com