Hello People, I need some clarification on Continuous Archiving and Point-In-Time Recovery (PITR). I have been able to replicate a postgresql 8.4 database from one machine to another using rsync and wal files. I do this as follows (Using debian gnu/linux squeeze): In *master* i have the following options under postgresql.conf: archive_mode = on # allows archiving to be done archive_command = 'test ! -f /var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/backup_in_progress || cp -i %p /var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/wal-archive/%f' # command to use to archive a logfile segment I start the backup on *master*: touch /var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/backup_in_progress DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S) psql --cluster 8.4/main -c "SELECT pg_start_backup('backup_${DATE}');" Then rsync on *standby*. rsync -avz --partial --progress --delete --rsh=ssh \ --exclude 'lost+found' --exclude 'postmaster.pid' --exclude 'postmaster.opts' --exclude 'wal-archive' \ postgres@$SRC_HOST:/var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/ /var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/ Plus all the tablespaces which are located on different directories and rsynced with same options as above (except the exclude) Then stop backup on *main*. psql --cluster 8.4/main -c "SELECT pg_stop_backup();" And transfer all the WAL files from *master* to *standby*: rsync -avz --partial --progress --rsh=ssh \ --exclude 'lost+found' \ postgres@$SRC_HOST:/var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/wal-archive/ /var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/wal-archive/ In *standby* i have in recovery.conf: restore_command = '/usr/lib/postgresql/8.4/bin/pg_standby -l -d -s 2 -t /var/run/postgresql/8.4-main.trigger /var/lib/postgresql/8.4/main/wal-archive %f %p %r 2>>/var/log/postgresql/postgresql-8.4-main-standby.log' recovery_end_command = 'rm -f /var/run/postgresql/8.4-main.trigger' Then start the database on *standby* and everything worked fine, I replicated the main database from one machine to another and later on the *standby* machine I process the logical backups which off course takes a lot of time. But there is one big issue: The database is about: 300 Gb of size, so rsyncing the data from one machine to another takes more than 2 hours, I don't know if I can change some rsync options in order to improve since this is too much time. Another thing is to improve the script and not having to rsync the database and just transferring the wal files and apply them every day, this is what I am trying to do without luck. So the question is: Can I have some continues wal archiving and then transfer all WAL files to *standby* everyday, recover the database and backup all data without having to rsync the data every time i make a backup ? For now i have to stick with 8.4 . Thank you very much for your time and support. Slds. -- Typed on my key64.org keyboard Nestor A Diaz -- Sent via pgsql-admin mailing list (pgsql-admin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-admin