 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Nicolai Tufar [mailto:ntufar@pisem.net] 
> Sent: 05 February 2004 17:35
> To: Dave Page; pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
> Subject: RE: [HACKERS] PITR Dead horse? 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Dave Page [mailto:dpage@vale-housing.co.uk]
> > Sent: Thursday, February 05, 2004 11:02 AM
> > To: ntufar@pisem.net; pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
> > Subject: RE: [HACKERS] PITR Dead horse?
> > Of course, but I would argue that my claim that PostgreSQL 
> is reliable 
> > is backed up by the lack of people posting messages like 'we had a 
> > powercut and now my DB is hosed'.
> 
> It's not like that. It's more like 'what will happen if we 
> had a powercut/ disk failure/cpu failure/memory failure, etc, 
> etc.' and that answer I have to give is 'why, there is PITR 
> of course!'. No other answer will pass in enterprise world. 
> Those people are not open-minded, they'd rather be safe than sorry.

Ahh, that's not quite what I thought you meant. It sounded like you were
questioning the reliability of PostgreSQL, not it's ability to be
recovered to point of failure.

> > Do they have specific problems with the reliability of PostgreSQL
> then?
> > Perhaps you could post details of how things have gone 
> wrong for them 
> > (assuming you haven't already - I don't recall anything on -hackers 
> > recently).
> 
> Nothing remarkable. PostgreSQL just works. Bu as I said 
> before, In enterprise world, good sleep at night is treasured 
> above all.

My SQL2K servers give me far more sleepless nights than PostgreSQL ever
did!

Regards, Dave.

Thu, 5 Feb 2004 18:49:48 -0000
"Dave Page" <dpage@vale-housing.co.uk>
Re: PITR Dead horse? 
"Dave Page" <dpage@vale-housing.co.uk> writes:
> Ahh, that's not quite what I thought you meant. It sounded like you were
> questioning the reliability of PostgreSQL, not it's ability to be
> recovered to point of failure.

I think the waters got muddied a bit by the suggestion elsewhere in the
thread (not from Nicolai, IIRC) that we needed a mailing list to talk
about reliability issues in general.  We know we need PITR to help us
become a more credible enterprise-grade database; so that discussion is
short and sweet.  What people were confused about was whether there was
enough other issues to need ongoing discussion.

			regards, tom lane

Thu, 05 Feb 2004 14:44:43 -0500
Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Re: PITR Dead horse? 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dave Page [mailto:dpage@vale-housing.co.uk]
> My SQL2K servers give me far more sleepless nights than PostgreSQL
ever
> did!

You bet! I totally agree with you.
Technicians like you, me and most people on this list
Already know that PostgreSQL is stable and reliable.
It is management that needs to be convinced, and for this
we need to have PITR in feature list.

> Regards, Dave.

Regards,
Nicolai


Thu, 5 Feb 2004 22:00:43 +0200
"Nicolai Tufar" <ntufar@pisem.net>
Re: PITR Dead horse? 
On Thu, 2004-02-05 at 14:00, Nicolai Tufar wrote:
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Dave Page [mailto:dpage@vale-housing.co.uk]
> > My SQL2K servers give me far more sleepless nights than PostgreSQL
> ever
> > did!
> 
> You bet! I totally agree with you.
> Technicians like you, me and most people on this list
> Already know that PostgreSQL is stable and reliable.
> It is management that needs to be convinced, and for this
> we need to have PITR in feature list.
> 
> > Regards, Dave.


As previously stated by Bruce I believe, the mindshare department needs
some work. For this, the PITR is a necessity, but also when comparing
features with other DBs that people and businesses are currently
familiar with.

-- 
Austin Gonyou <austin@coremetrics.com>
Coremetrics, Inc.

Thu, 05 Feb 2004 14:15:26 -0600
Austin Gonyou <austin@coremetrics.com>
Re: PITR Dead horse?
Austin Gonyou wrote:
> On Thu, 2004-02-05 at 14:00, Nicolai Tufar wrote:
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Dave Page [mailto:dpage@vale-housing.co.uk]
> > > My SQL2K servers give me far more sleepless nights than PostgreSQL
> > ever
> > > did!
> > 
> > You bet! I totally agree with you.
> > Technicians like you, me and most people on this list
> > Already know that PostgreSQL is stable and reliable.
> > It is management that needs to be convinced, and for this
> > we need to have PITR in feature list.
> > 
> > > Regards, Dave.
> 
> 
> As previously stated by Bruce I believe, the mindshare department needs
> some work. For this, the PITR is a necessity, but also when comparing
> features with other DBs that people and businesses are currently
> familiar with.

PITR is required to recover all data after total hardware failure.  It
isn't just a mindshare issue.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  pgman@candle.pha.pa.us               |  (610) 359-1001
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  13 Roberts Road
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Newtown Square, Pennsylvania 19073

Sat, 7 Feb 2004 19:45:18 -0500 (EST)
Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>
Re: PITR Dead horse?
A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, pgman@candle.pha.pa.us (Bruce Momjian) wrote:
> Austin Gonyou wrote:
>> As previously stated by Bruce I believe, the mindshare department needs
>> some work. For this, the PITR is a necessity, but also when comparing
>> features with other DBs that people and businesses are currently
>> familiar with.
>
> PITR is required to recover all data after total hardware failure.  It
> isn't just a mindshare issue.

One of the valuable "use cases" of PITR is in replication, and
correspondingly, one of the valuable "use cases" of replication is in
doing major version upgrades.

As a result, a _really valuable thing_ would be for the "PITR reader"
process to be able to read data from "more elderly" versions of
PostgreSQL.  

That may not prove practical, but the more flexible it is, the more
useful it certainly is...
-- 
"cbbrowne","@","cbbrowne.com"
http://www.ntlug.org/~cbbrowne/wp.html
Space Corps Directive #997: Work done  by an officer's doppleganger in
a parallel universe cannot be claimed as overtime.  -- Red Dwarf

Sun, 08 Feb 2004 00:05:52 -0500
Christopher Browne <cbbrowne@acm.org>
Re: PITR Dead horse?