Re: Some suggestions for the non Linux installers

On Thu, 9 Apr 2009, Dave Page wrote:

> I suspect if you are seeing multiple failures then it is likely a side
> effect of a local security policy or similar. If you can supply an
> installation log that would help diagnose the problem.

If you look at the forum post Thomas referenced, the errors all look like
variations on this during initdb:

creating directory C:/Archivos de programa/PostgreSQL/8.3/data ... ok
creating subdirectories ... ok
selecting default max_connections ... 10
selecting default shared_buffers/max_fsm_pages ... 400kB/20000
creating configuration files ... ok
creating template1 database in
C:/Archivos de programa/PostgreSQL/8.3/data/base/1 ...
child process exited with exit code 1

I'm not sure whether the install log will give you any additional detail
beyond that, or if this is an installer issue at all. Looks to me like
initdb is presuming the subdirectories it creates inside of PGDATA will
inherit the permissions of the parent directory, but that isn't the case
on this particular Windows system. I know it's possible to play with
inheritance in ways that would give unexpected behavior (for those used to
the UNIX model) on NTFS; see "Inherited vs. Explicit Permissions" at
http://www.windowsecurity.com/articles/Understanding-Windows-NTFS-Permissions.html
for background.

While whether supporting odd configurations like that is deemed worthwhile
or not, I think improving on only getting "child process exited" in this
situation would help a lot of people out.

--
* Greg Smith gsmith(at)gregsmith(dot)com http://www.gregsmith.com Baltimore, MD