I don't have any good news for you. Yes, you can set up a server on a different port and perform a dump and reload while both systems are up, but as you say, you are going to miss inserts during the dump because pg_dump takes a snapshot when it starts.
My only suggestion is to keep the old database SELECT-only during the dump, or somehow gather the changes that happen after the dump and manually move them to the new database. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reiner Dassing wrote: > Hello all! > > I would like to ask what would be the best procedure to upgrade to a > new version of PostgreSQL in a production system when there is a 'initdb' > necessary? > > Situation: > We are running PostgreSQL in a production system. There are about 1000 > selects and about 100 inserts per minute. > > > To upgrade to PostgreSQL 7.2.3 there is an 'initdb' necessary. > > The straight forward approach is to shut down the PostgreSQL server > and restore the saved databases. > But, this approach is not possible for us. > > We need a "smooth" switch over with a downtime of maximum 5 minutes. > > It is possible to set up an other filesystem and another PostgreSQL server > with another port number to initdb the database and restore the databases > and tables backuped at a given time. > But meanwhile some new inserts (well a lot of them) did happen in the existing > databases. > How should the missed inserts be transferred to the new PostgreSQL server? > > What would you recommend for this switch? > > Thank you for your discussion! > -- > -- > Mit freundlichen Gruessen / With best regards > Reiner Dassing > > > ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- > TIP 6: Have you searched our list archives? > > http://archives.postgresql.org > -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us [EMAIL PROTECTED] | (610) 359-1001 + If your life is a hard drive, | 13 Roberts Road + Christ can be your backup. | Newtown Square, Pennsylvania 19073 ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 2: you can get off all lists at once with the unregister command (send "unregister YourEmailAddressHere" to [EMAIL PROTECTED])
