Re: Are file system level differential/incremental backups possible?

On Thu, Oct 13, 2011 at 12:04 AM, Bob Hatfield <bobhatfield(at)gmail(dot)com>wrote:

> > Anyway, a better way for you would be to do a regular backup (with
> pg_start_backup, copy and pg_stop_backup) and then use wal archive_command
> to keep the xlogs between 2 full backups.
>
> Thanks Julien. Can pg_start/stop_backup() be used for regular full
> file system backups? All of the documentation I've read only refers
> to using those for warm standby/wal shipping methods.
>

Yes, and it's the only way to do a file backup without stopping the server.
Careful, the command can last a while as it forces a checkpoint (see the doc
for more details).

It's used for warm standby to create a copy of the server, before the wals
that'll be generated can continue to restore it.