Re: Purpose of pgsql/data/global directory? - permission

Thanks for the suggestions. In the process status listing, I did find two
instances of the postmaster running - one that was a couple months old. I
had uninstalled and reinstalled postgresql yesterday in an attempt to fix a
previous problem I had with pg_dump version mismatches (You might recall
that question I had sent previously to the novice list). Apparently my
default RedHat install included their version of postgres and my install of
7.4.6 didn't simply replace the pg_dump executables.

I killed the old postmaster process, changed the postgresql.conf file to set
it to allow tcpip_sockets and I can now connect with pgadmin.
I also was able to successfully backup and restore now that I have gotten
rid of the RedHat files and have consistent version utilities.

Thanks, David

-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Lane [mailto:tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us]
Sent: Monday, May 02, 2005 8:31 PM
To: DavidF(at)nhb(dot)org
Cc: pgsql-novice(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: Re: [NOVICE] Purpose of pgsql/data/global directory? - permissions
error

DavidF(at)nhb(dot)org writes:
> I know this is not a pgadmin forum, but I get an error when trying to
create
> a connection to my server using pgadminIII, "could not open file
> /usr/local/pgsql/data/global/1262. Permission denied".

global/1262 is the "pg_database" table. This would be just about the
first table opened during backend startup. The failure suggests that
either the permissions on that file (or one of the directories leading
to it) are messed up, or that the postmaster was started using the
wrong userid (ie, not the userid that owns the data files).

> I can connect fine using psql.

Oh?

AFAICS it's impossible for Postgres to fail that way for some
connections and not others. My guess is that pgadmin is actually
connecting to a different postmaster than your psql attempts are
connecting to, and that there's something hosed about the postmaster
that pgadmin is connecting to. It's hard to say more without more
data, but you could try "ps auxww | grep postmaster" and see what
turns up.

regards, tom lane