Re: problem with initdb

[John McKown <john.archie.mckown@xxxxxxxxx>]

If it were me, I'd probably do something like (my id is not root, but I can use sudo to run something as root)

sudo mv -vn /var/lib/pgsql/data /var/lib/pgsql/data-old

sudo su - postgres #change to user postgres

initdb

pg_ctl start

exit #exit back to my id, from being postgres

If you need to, after doing the "initdb", compare the pg_hba.conf and postgresql.conf files in the two directories (/var/lib/pgsql/data and /var/lib/pgsql/data-old

On Tue, Jan 7, 2014 at 11:11 AM, Susan Cassidy <susan.cassidy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I ran an initdb, but got a message that the Encoding I specified was invalid, so I tried to run it again, and now I get:

initdb: directory "/var/lib/pgsql/data" exists but is not empty
If you want to create a new database system, either remove or empty
the directory "/var/lib/pgsql/data" or run initdb
with an argument other than "/var/lib/pgsql/data".

The only thing in the $PGDATA directory are the pg_hba.conf and postgresql.conf files.

If I try to run a pg_ctl start, I get this:
17271 2014-01-07 09:10:15.060 PST  FATAL:  "/var/lib/pgsql/data" is not a valid data directory
  17271 2014-01-07 09:10:15.060 PST  DETAIL:  File "/var/lib/pgsql/data/PG_VERSION" is missing.

What can I do?

This is postgres 8.4, which is the only version currently available for Scientific Linux in its repository.

Thanks,
Susan

--

Wasn't there something about a PASCAL programmer knowing the value of everything and the Wirth of nothing?

Maranatha! <><
John McKown