Re: BUG #16259: Cannot Use "pg_ctl start -l logfile" on Clean Install on Windows Server 2012/2016

+Heath

On 2/14/20 12:45 PM, Tom Lane wrote:
> PG Bug reporting form <noreply(at)postgresql(dot)org> writes:
>> When testing PostgreSQL 12.2 on Windows built using MSVC (this potentially
>> affects mingw too, though untested) on both Windows Server 2012 & 2016, we
>> are having issues with a newly generated log file on a fresh PostgreSQL
>> cluster when PostgreSQL is started with pg_ctl. If the log file was created
>> with a prior version of PostgreSQL, or if you manually create the log file
>> and grant the executing user the appropriate file access permissions,
>> everything works fine.
>> In other words, the issue occurs when passing a file name to the `-l` flag
>> where the log file does not already exist.
>
> So ... why aren't we seeing that in the buildfarm? The TAP tests
> certainly do that, and I think the core regression tests do too.

Heath can speak to this one. He's currently looking at Dory to see why
that is.

Per my quick look, there's only one animal that has Windows Server 2016
(Dory) and none with 2012.

>> We think this was introduced in 0da33c76. One approach for a fix would be to
>> add a condition so the added code only executes if the file already exists,
>> and if the file does not exist it executes the "snprintf" command like
>> before.
>
> Without an explanation for why it's not failing everywhere, I don't
> have a lot of faith in that being an improvement.

Sure, mostly was to find a starting point.

Jonathan