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createdb

Name

createdb — Create a new Postgres database

createdb [ dbname ]
createdb [ -h host ] [ -p port ]
      [ -D datadir ] [ -u ] [ dbname ]

Inputs

-h host: Specifies the hostname of the machine on which the postmaster is running. Defaults to using a local Unix domain socket rather than an IP connection.
-p port: Specifies the Internet TCP/IP port or local Unix domain socket file extension on which the postmaster is listening for connections. The port number defaults to 5432, or the value of the PGPORT environment variable (if set).
-u: Use password authentication. Prompts for username and password.
-D datadir: Specifies the alternate database location for this database installation. This is the location of the installation system tables, not the location of this specific database, which may be different.
dbname: Specifies the name of the database to be created. The name must be unique among all Postgres databases in this installation. dbname defaults to the value of the USER environment variable.

Outputs

createdb will create files in the PGDATA/dbname/ data area for the new database.

Connection to database 'template1' failed. connectDB() failed: Is the postmaster running and accepting connections at 'UNIX Socket' on port 'port'? createdb: database creation failed on dbname.: createdb could not attach to the postmaster process on the specified host and port. If you see this message, ensure that the postmaster is running on the proper host and that you have specified the proper port. If your site uses an authentication system, ensure that you have obtained the required authentication credentials.
Connection to database 'template1' failed. FATAL 1: SetUserId: user 'username' is not in 'pg_shadow' createdb: database creation failed on dbname.: You do not have a valid entry in the relation pg_shadow and and will not be allowed to access Postgres. Contact your Postgres administrator.
ERROR: user 'username' is not allowed to create/destroy databases createdb: database creation failed on dbname.: You do not have permission to create new databases. Contact your Postgres site administrator.
ERROR: createdb: database 'dbname' already exists. createdb: database creation failed on dbname.: The database already exists.
createdb: database creation failed on dbname.: An internal error occurred in psql or in the backend server. Ensure that your site administrator has properly installed Postgresand initialized the site with initdb.

Note: createdb internally runs CREATE DATABASE from psql while connected to the template1 database.

Description

createdb creates a new Postgres database. The person who executes this command becomes the database administrator, or DBA, for this database and is the only person, other than the Postgres super-user, who can destroy it.

createdb is a shell script that invokes psql. Hence, a postmaster process must be running on the database server host before createdb is executed. The PGOPTION and PGREALM environment variables will be passed on to psql and processed as described in psql.

Usage

To create the database demo using the postmaster on the local host, port 5432:

$ createdb demo

To create the database demo using the postmaster on host eden, port 5000:

$ createdb -p 5000 -h eden demo

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