Re: PostgreSQL upgrade -> fails to start server

Quoting Martijn van Oosterhout (kleptog(at)svana(dot)org):

> Ok, IIRC the reason you need to initdb is because indexes use your specific
> locale to work. Without knowing the locale, indexes can't be used.
> That said, it seems to be a bit strict to refuse to start the server.

I thought so too. But then I thought maybe the data stored inside the
database is affected by this locale setting too?

> In any case, there is a program pg_controldata which dumps the current
> locale. It may help to determine if you edit pg_control properly.

It's impossible to edit pg_control by hand with something like a hex
editor because it has checksums to verify it's integrity.

I'd need to create a program that constructs the pg_control internal
structure to change the locale stored inside.

> Once you can start it, pg_dumpall and restart.
> Ofcourse, if you have backups...

The data is not yet lost. It's still on my disk. It's just that the
postmaster won't start because of this locale-thing. To fix it I need
the postmaster running, and to get the postmaster running, I need to fix
it. It loops :)

> In any case, as a last resort you can try pgfsck. It ignores your
> locale and so may be able to recover some of your data.

I downloaded pgfsck and ran it over the database. According to pgfsck my
complete database is fscked-up and no data comes out of the tool's
effort. That is, I have not yet tried to turn the hex strings into ascii.

> Hope this helps,

I guess I need to find out how to construct my own pg_control file ;)

Sander.
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