Re: indices are crashed after installation of rpm

Peter Keller <peter(dot)keller(at)bvv(dot)bayern(dot)de> writes:
> we are running PostgreSQL 7.0.2 on Solaris 2.6,/x86 compiled by gcc 2.8.1.

> The first time we installed Postgres everything was ok. But after a new
> installation of the package ( - same Postgres version! - just the starting
> script changed) all indices where damaged (this is reproducible).

> In the installation script the postmaster is stopped and started. Is it
> possible the stopping and starting is crashing the indices,
> because sometimes just stopping and starting the postmaster ist crashing the
> indices (not reproducible)?

Do you build with --enable-locale? If so, check to see if the
postmaster is being restarted with a different locale setting
(different LANG or LC_xxx environment variables). Any change
in the effective sort order defined by the locale setting will
leave text indices corrupted. Unfortunately, system boot scripts
very often run with different environment than user shells do...

7.1 has some defenses against this: the locale prevailing at initdb
time is saved, and adopted by every subsequent postmaster start.
But in older releases you just have to be careful.

regards, tom lane