Re: Starting the database server (2)

On Tue, 26 Nov 2002, Javier Perez wrote:

> Hi guys,
>
> I still have a problem to start the database server as I wrote in the
> first mail. I read many and many tutorials, but nothing is working to
> start the postmaster.
>
> 1. When I create the database cluster I get this message:
>
> (everything is installed correctly)
>
> Success. You can now start the database server using:
> sudo -u root sudo -u pgsql /usr/local/pgsql/bin/pg_ctl \ -D
> /usr/local/pgsql/data -l /sw/var/log/postgresql/logfile start
>
> When I enter this command line, it ask me a password. I enter the
> postgres password and I get this message:
>
> sudo: no passwd entry for pgsql!
>

Well bearing in mind your comments:

> ... Do you think my PostgreSQL isn't correctly installed?
>
> I work on MacOSX 10.2 and I installed PostgreSQL 7.2.2. In my case
> PostgreSQL was include in a CD pack with another open source called
> Grass. It's a GIS (geographical information system). When I installed
> this open source, it automatically installed PostgreSQL and I couldn't
> choose anything during the installation. I think I don't need to
> compile PostgreSQL after this. I tell you this because I don't know if
> this has an influence with my problems for starting postmaster.

I think Grass has a errrr...bad installation system.

For a start do you have a user called pgsql and does it belong in a group
called pgsql?

Who owns /usr/local/pgsql/data? (i.e. who did you run initdb as?)

Is /sw/var/log/postgresql/logfile writable by pgsql (or the user from the last
question)?

It could be as simple as changing pgsql in the above sudo sequence to use the
correct username or you could have to start fixing up the sudo configuration
and then still have other configuration changes to make. Even then you may
still have problems judging from the other steps you tried. Although I must
admit I didn't read those too closely. In my view the Grass install is ... and
has cocked up things for you, therefore you'll probably find you have more than
that sudo change to make things work.

--
Nigel J. Andrews