Re: cleanup of pgsql_tmp directory

"Robert Klaus" <rklaus(at)nexgenwireless(dot)com> writes:
> This morning we found out that our filesystem was at 98% and filling
> quickly. We immediately found one query running for a long time and saw
> 1500+ files in the pgsql_tmp directory we could attribute to it.

> I killed using pg_terminate_backend and some space was reclaimed, but the
> temporary files from the process are still in the pgsql_tmp directory.

Temp files should be deleted during proc_exit processing. You're sure
you used pg_terminate_backend() and not something more aggressive? Are
you sure these files actually belong to the process you killed?

> We're on postgres 8.4.9 on centos. Which process should be deleting these
> files and what is normally the delay? I'm assuming the postmaster process
> will eventually delete them, but does the server have to be bounced in order
> for this to happen? It's been 30 minutes since the process was killed.

If a process failed to remove its own temp files for some reason,
there's no other mechanism for getting rid of them, except that a
postmaster restart will run around and clean out all the temp
directories.

regards, tom lane