"Stuart Grimshaw" <stuart.grimshaw@xxxxxxxxx> writes: > On 12/23/06, Stuart Grimshaw <stuart.grimshaw@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: >> berble=# select * from headlines ; >> ERROR: could not access status of transaction 1668180339 >> DETAIL: could not open file "pg_clog/0636": No such file or directory >> >> Using Postgres 8.1.5 from Debian unstable, I got the above error, and >> I have no idea what it means? It looks like a corrupt-data problem, specifically something has stomped on the xmin field of a tuple header. (Because xmin is the first readily-checkable field examined when visiting a tuple, "could not access status of transaction" is the most likely result from wholesale overwriting of a portion of a table.) My calculator says 1668180339 is equal to ASCII "cnis" (or "sinc" depending on your machine's endianness) which makes it seem somewhat likely that some text has gotten dumped into a Postgres data file. We've seen that happen before from disk or operating system misfeasance :-(. See the PG archives concerning procedures for localizing and removing trashed rows --- as a first guess about where it's discussed, try searching for threads mentioning pg_filedump ... regards, tom lane
