Re: [PATCHES] xlog directory at initdb time

On Jan 2, 2007, at 7:18 AM, Tom Lane wrote:

> Peter Eisentraut <peter_e(at)gmx(dot)net> writes:
>> Am Mittwoch, 27. Dezember 2006 02:56 schrieb Euler Taveira de
>> Oliveira:
>>> This simple patch lets someone specifies the xlog directory at
>>> initdb
>>> time. It uses symlinks to do it, and create and/or set
>>> permissions at
>>> the directory as appropriate.
>
>> We already had this functionality in initdb a few versions ago.
>> Did you
>> review why it was removed?
>
> The discussion thread seems to start here:
>
> http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2002-08/msg00306.php
>
> As best I can tell the objections came from the fact that Thomas had
> implemented it as a postmaster-start-time switch, which made it a
> foot-gun because you could mistakenly start the postmaster with a
> different XLOG than you were using before. That would not apply to a
> symlink-made-by-initdb approach. All this is doing is formalizing
> something we already suggest people do by hand...

I guess the downside there is that it won't work on platforms that
don't support symlinks, whereas the postmaster switch would. Not that
I condone using such platforms ;^)

-Casey