Re: mount -o async - is it safe?

Hi,

thanks :)

> > If -o async means "all I/O is asyncronous except stuff explicitly
> > fsync()ed" you're fine. Otherwise...
>
> That's the way it works. Async is the default setting for most
> filesystems, but fsync() is always honored, at last as far as
> non-lying hardware will allow. :)

That sounds good :)

ext's journalling should take care of the rest I guess - does that sound ok?
I have read in various places I think that pgSQL doesn't need any
directory-level operations in keeping WAL up to date so provided the ext3
partition remains mountable then the database should be fine,

> > The usual advice is to stick the WAL on a properly synced partition and
> > stick the rest somewhere else. Note, I have no experience with this,
> > it's just what I've heard.
>
> This might not be optimal, as having every write synchronous actually
> results in more synced writes than are strictly necessary.

Actually I thought that *all* the database had to have fsync() work correctly;
not for integrity on failed transactions, but to maintain integrity during
checkpointing as well. But I could well be wrong!

thanks,

Shane