Re: tuplesort error from create index (?)

Howdy:

I apologize for not being complete. This is the version
we're running:

[snip]

[shaunn(at)hmp init.d]$ psql -V
psql (PostgreSQL) 7.1.3
contains readline, history support
Portions Copyright (c) 1996-2001, PostgreSQL Global Development Group
Portions Copyright (c) 1996 Regents of the University of California
Read the file COPYRIGHT or use the command \copyright to see the
usage and distribution terms.

[/snip]

Our resources:

[snip]

[shaunn(at)hmp cron.daily]$ free
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 1545016 1473492 71524 0 79980 1273248
-/+ buffers/cache: 120264 1424752
Swap: 1044184 49984 994200

[/snip]

This is the amount of disk we have:

[snip]

[shaunn(at)hmp bin]$ df -x smbfs
Filesystem 1k-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/hda6 4192800 2601592 1591208 62% /
/dev/hda1 2063504 1804692 153992 92% /old
/dev/md0 175841284 18931000 156910284 11% /raid
/dev/hdb1 30014264 25955764 4058500 86% /samba

[/snip]

The /raid filesystem is where Postgres lives. The /raid filesystem
(as you may have guessed) is also a RAID 5 fileset.

I can dump the table (actually, it gets dropped and recreated every
week or so), but right now, I only have the one database. I will
give you all the information I have (which includes trying to
recreate the table in a new database).

Thanks!

-X

-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Lane [mailto:tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us]
Sent: Wednesday, January 02, 2002 1:35 PM
To: Johnson, Shaunn
Cc: pgsql-general(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: Re: [GENERAL] tuplesort error from create index (?)

"Johnson, Shaunn" <SJohnson6(at)bcbsm(dot)com> writes:
> I am running Postgres 7.1 on Mandrake Linux 8.0,
> kernel version 2.4.16.

Could you upgrade to PG 7.1.3 and see if the problem is still there?

> I am trying to create an index on a table:
> database=> create index key_i on class (contract, memberid, date)
> and I get the following error:
> ERROR: tuplesort: unexpected end of data

Weird. Is it possible you are running out of disk space? (The sort to
create the index is probably using temporary disk files.) I should
think that you'd get an error saying that, though, not this error.

If you have lots of disk space, it'd be worth trying to pg_dump the
table, load it into a newly created database, and see if the error can
be reproduced on that fresh copy. Knowing whether the error can be
reproduced outside your existing database would be helpful.

regards, tom lane

PS: does anyone know if there are any serious bugs in Linux 2.4.16?
I recall hearing about some hasty updates of recent kernels, but am
not up-to-date on which versions to avoid.