Re: online tape backup

On Samstag, 10. Februar 2007 01:51 Eduardo J. Ortega wrote:
> 1) pg_start_backup
> 2) tar to my tape device /data/postgresql excluding
> /data/postgresql/pg_xlog 3) pg_stop_backup
> 4) delete WAL files under /data/pg_trans_log/ (which is the directory
> to which archive_command copies my archived WAL files) with name
> "smaller" than the name of the last 000*.backup
> 5) append to previously created tar on the tape the WAL
> directory /data/pg_trans_log/

Dear all, I'm replying to this message because it's a good start, and
I'm thinking of switching from currently pg_dump on all databases to
using the concept of base+WAL backup.

What we did until now was (not using WAL)
- pg_dump for each DB
- vacuum full analyze for each DB after backup

From what I understand, if I run a vacuum, the WAL logs will be
enormous, as they do not simply store the vacuum command itself, but
every single operation done on the db.

If that's true, running vacuum before the base backup could be better,
as there are less WAL logs to store, making the backup smaller, right?

mfg zmi
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