Re: Confusing error message with too-large file in pg_basebackup

On Fri, 20 Nov 2015 15:20:12 -0500
Tom Lane <tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us> wrote:

> Actually ... why don't we get rid of the limit? wikipedia's entry on
> tar format says
>
> ... only 11 octal digits can be stored. This gives a maximum file size
> of 8 gigabytes on archived files. To overcome this limitation, star in
> 2001 introduced a base-256 coding that is indicated by setting the
> high-order bit of the leftmost byte of a numeric field. GNU-tar and
> BSD-tar followed this idea.
>
> If that extension is as widespread as this suggests, then following it
> when we have a file > 8GB seems like a better answer than failing
> entirely. If you try to read the dump with an old tar program, old
> pg_restore, etc, it might fail ... but are you really worse off than
> if you couldn't make the dump at all?
>
> regards, tom lane

+1

-dg

--
David Gould daveg(at)sonic(dot)net
If simplicity worked, the world would be overrun with insects.