Re: Idle in transaction - Explination ..

From: "Uwe C(dot) Schroeder" <uwe(at)oss4u(dot)com>
To: pgsql-general(at)postgresql(dot)org
Cc: Weslee Bilodeau <weslee(dot)bilodeau(at)hypermediasystems(dot)com>
Subject: Re: Idle in transaction - Explination ..
Date: 2007-01-24 22:31:38
Message-ID: 200701241431.38468.uwe@oss4u.com
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Well, in very short terms: a "idle" transaction is not committed. This means,
when it's a writing transaction, that in the best case you have one or more
row locks blocking access to the updated/inserted rows and in the worst case
one or more table locks, which will block access to a table completely.

On Wednesday 24 January 2007 13:15, Weslee Bilodeau wrote:
> Where I work I'm in charge of more then a few PostgreSQL databases.
>
> I understand why idle in transaction is bad, however I have some
> developers who I'm having a real difficult time fully explaining to them
> why its bad.
>
> Oh, and by bad I mean they have transactions that are sitting idle for
> 6+ hours at a time.
>
> Mainly because they don't speak very good English, and my words like
> MVCC and VACUUM have them tilting their heads wondering what language
> I'm speaking.
>
> I've tried searching the mailing lists for a good explanation, but
> haven't really found one thats easy to translate.
>
> They are Japanese, but I don't speak Japanese, so finding any resource
> in Japanese that explains it is beyond my ability.
>
> Would anyone happen to have a simple explanation, or a page online thats
> written in Japanese that I can pass off that might explain why this is bad?
>
> Is there a Wiki somewhere that says "101 ways to cause your DBA an
> aneurysm" that covers things like this? :)
>
>
> Weslee
>
>
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UC

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