Tales From A Lazy Fat DBA

PgBackRest: A reliable backup and recovery solution to your PostgreSQL clusters …

Posted by FatDBA on April 8, 2021

Hi Everyone,

Recently while working for one of the customer, I was asked to propose a reliable backup and recovery solution for the database clusters. The customer was using both EDB and open source PostgreSQL. The ask is to take all major types of backups i.e. Full, Incremental and Differential, and last two types is to cover their anticipation for ways to decrease amount of time and disk space usage to take a full backup. After considering all their prerequisites and necessities, I came up with the idea of using PgBackRest which I have tested in some of my previous assignments too. PgBackRest is an open source backup tool that creates physical backups with some improvements compared to the classic pg_basebackup tool.

It comes up with lot of cool features which otherwise isn’t possible with pg_basebackup and few of them not even with other backup tools. Features like parallel backups, encryption, differential and incremental backups, backup integrity checks, archive expiration policies, local and remote operations, backup resume etc.

This post is all about this popular backup tool PgBackRest, how to configure and how to perform backup and restore operations using the tool. I will be doing few test cases here on my personal lab where I have RHEL and have PostgreSQL 12 installed.

I have already installed the tool using PostgreSQL YUM repository. It’s pretty straight forward, do ‘yum install pgbackrest‘ and that’s it!

-bash-4.2$ which pgbackrest /usr/bin/pgbackrest

Let’s checked the version.

-bash-4.2$ pgbackrest version pgBackRest 2.32

Now when the tool is installed and working fine, time to configure its core property file or config (pgbackrest.conf) file. I will be first creating a new directory to house this core confgiuration file for the tool.

[root@canttowin ~]# mkdir /etc/pgbackrest [root@canttowin ~]# vi /etc/pgbackrest/pgbackrest.conf

Lets add global and local database details to the configuration file. Here I am setting full backup retention of 2 days (repo1-retention-full=2), I am only passing required set of params to it, else there is a huge list of them which you can use and defined under config file.

[root@canttowin ~]# more /etc/pgbackrest/pgbackrest.conf [global] repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest repo1-retention-full=2

[openpgsql] pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/ pg1-port=5432

If you have noticed, all operations above I have performed with root account/user, and this should not be the case, ownership should be passed to PostgreSQL database owner, that is ‘postgres’ user in my case. So, let’s fix permissions first before we do our first backup.

[root@canttowin ~]# chmod 0750 /var/lib/pgbackrest [root@canttowin ~]# chown -R postgres:postgres /var/lib/pgbackrest [root@canttowin ~]# ls -ll /var/log/pgbackrest/ total 8 -rw-r-----. 1 root root 0 Apr 4 04:23 all-start.log -rw-r----- 1 root root 185 Mar 27 05:37 all-start.log.1.gz -rw-r----- 1 postgres postgres 450 Apr 6 00:54 openpgsql-stanza-create.log [root@canttowin ~]# [root@canttowin ~]# chown -R postgres:postgres /var/log/pgbackrest [root@canttowin ~]# [root@canttowin ~]# ls -ll /var/log/pgbackrest/ total 8 -rw-r-----. 1 postgres postgres 0 Apr 4 04:23 all-start.log -rw-r----- 1 postgres postgres 185 Mar 27 05:37 all-start.log.1.gz -rw-r----- 1 postgres postgres 450 Apr 6 00:54 openpgsql-stanza-create.log

All set with the permissions, now next is to set few of the parameters within postgresql.conf file to make pgbackrest handle WAL segments, pushing them immediately to archive.

[postgres@canttowin data]$ [postgres@canttowin data]$ more /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/postgresql.conf |grep archive archive_mode = on archive_command = 'pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql archive-push %p'

Above changes to database configuration requires a restart of the database, so, let’s do it.

[postgres@canttowin bin]$ ./pg_ctl -D /var/lib/pgsql/12/data stop waiting for server to shut down…. done server stopped [postgres@canttowin bin]$ ./pg_ctl -D /var/lib/pgsql/12/data start waiting for server to start….2021-04-06 01:03:45.837 EDT [28770] LOG: starting PostgreSQL 12.6 on x86_64-pc-linux-gnu, compiled by gcc (GCC) 4.8.5 20150623 (Red Hat 4.8.5-44), 64-bit 2021-04-06 01:03:45.838 EDT [28770] LOG: listening on IPv6 address "::1", port 5432 2021-04-06 01:03:45.838 EDT [28770] LOG: listening on IPv4 address "127.0.0.1", port 5432 2021-04-06 01:03:45.861 EDT [28770] LOG: listening on Unix socket "/var/run/postgresql/.s.PGSQL.5432" 2021-04-06 01:03:45.911 EDT [28770] LOG: listening on Unix socket "/tmp/.s.PGSQL.5432" 2021-04-06 01:03:45.983 EDT [28770] LOG: redirecting log output to logging collector process 2021-04-06 01:03:45.983 EDT [28770] HINT: Future log output will appear in directory "log". done server started

Next is to create the ‘STANZA‘, A stanza defines the backup configuration for a specific PostgreSQL database cluster.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest stanza-create --stanza=openpgsql --log-level-console=info 2021-04-06 00:54:31.731 P00 INFO: stanza-create command begin 2.32: --exec-id=24839-da2916aa --log-level-console=info --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --pg1-port=5432 --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql 2021-04-06 00:54:32.361 P00 INFO: stanza-create for stanza 'openpgsql' on repo1 2021-04-06 00:54:32.400 P00 INFO: stanza-create command end: completed successfully (672ms)

Next, we will check if everything is okay, this ‘check‘ command will check the cluster and validates archive_command and other related settings, if no error, then it’s all good.
[postgres@canttowin bin]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql check --log-level-console=info 2021-04-06 01:07:18.941 P00 INFO: check command begin 2.32: --exec-id=30501-dbf76c75 --log-level-console=info --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --pg1-port=5432 --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql 2021-04-06 01:07:19.553 P00 INFO: check repo1 configuration (primary) 2021-04-06 01:07:19.778 P00 INFO: check repo1 archive for WAL (primary) 2021-04-06 01:07:20.196 P00 INFO: WAL segment 000000010000000000000057 successfully archived to '/var/lib/pgbackrest/archive/openpgsql/12-1/0000000100000000/000000010000000000000057-dd44b724c7a9e257512f5c9d3ecf5d87f7ae9f67.gz' on repo1 2021-04-06 01:07:20.197 P00 INFO: check command end: completed successfully (1258ms)

All good, time to take our first backup, we have to use ‘type‘ argument with values full, incr, diff for all three types of backups. As this is our first backup, if you go and try for diff and incr backups, they will still go for the full backup as they requires a base backup to consider.
Below are the runtime logs, I have used option ‘log-level-console=info‘ which prints log information, warnings and errors, other possible values with this parameter are off, error, warn, detail, debug and trace.

[postgres@canttowin bin]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --type=full backup --log-level-console=info 2021-04-06 01:07:49.917 P00 INFO: backup command begin 2.32: --exec-id=30602-14142f51 --log-level-console=info --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --pg1-port=5432 --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-full=2 --stanza=openpgsql --type=full 2021-04-06 01:07:50.646 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_start_backup(): backup begins after the next regular checkpoint completes 2021-04-06 01:07:51.362 P00 INFO: backup start archive = 000000010000000000000059, lsn = 0/59000060 2021-04-06 01:07:53.028 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/16415 (13.5MB, 22%) checksum d8deb3703748d22554be2fb29c0ed105bab9658c 2021-04-06 01:07:53.782 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/16426 (5MB, 30%) checksum 29a07de6e53a110380ef984d3effca334a07d6e6 2021-04-06 01:07:54.176 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/16423 (2.2MB, 33%) checksum 5184ac361b2bef0df25a34e91636a085fc526930 2021-04-06 01:07:54.222 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/1255 (632KB, 34%) checksum edd483d42330ae26a455b3ee40e5c2b41cb298d5 2021-04-06 01:07:54.334 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/1255 (632KB, 35%) checksum edd483d42330ae26a455b3ee40e5c2b41cb298d5 2021-04-06 01:07:54.434 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/1255 (632KB, 36%) checksum edd483d42330ae26a455b3ee40e5c2b41cb298d5 …. …… 2021-04-06 01:08:05.364 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/PG_VERSION (3B, 100%) checksum ad552e6dc057d1d825bf49df79d6b98eba846ebe 2021-04-06 01:08:05.369 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/6100 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:05.372 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/6000 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:05.376 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/4185 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:05.379 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/4183 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:05.390 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/4181 (0B, 100%) …. ….. 2021-04-06 01:08:06.735 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/1/14040 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:06.738 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/1/14035 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:06.743 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/1/14030 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:06.847 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/1/14025 (0B, 100%) 2021-04-06 01:08:06.848 P00 INFO: full backup size = 61MB 2021-04-06 01:08:06.848 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_stop_backup() and wait for all WAL segments to archive 2021-04-06 01:08:07.068 P00 INFO: backup stop archive = 000000010000000000000059, lsn = 0/59000170 2021-04-06 01:08:07.107 P00 INFO: check archive for segment(s) 000000010000000000000059:000000010000000000000059 2021-04-06 01:08:07.354 P00 INFO: new backup label = 20210406-010750F 2021-04-06 01:08:07.489 P00 INFO: backup command end: completed successfully (17575ms) 2021-04-06 01:08:07.489 P00 INFO: expire command begin 2.32: --exec-id=30602-14142f51 --log-level-console=info --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-full=2 --stanza=openpgsql 2021-04-06 01:08:07.500 P00 INFO: expire command end: completed successfully (11ms) [postgres@canttowin bin]$

So, our first backup is done. Now, let’s check it’s detail (size, timings, WAL details etc.).

[postgres@canttowin bin]$ pgbackrest info
stanza: openpgsql
    status: ok
    cipher: none

    db (current)
        wal archive min/max (12): 000000010000000000000056/000000010000000000000059

        full backup: 20210406-010650F
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 01:06:50 / 2021-04-06 01:07:12
            wal start/stop: 000000010000000000000056 / 000000010000000000000056
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 61MB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 8.0MB

When we have our first full backup ready, let’s take the differential backup.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --type=diff --log-level-console=info backup 2021-04-06 14:40:34.145 P00 INFO: backup command begin 2.32: --exec-id=54680-0dd25993 --log-level-console=info --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --pg1-port=5432 --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-full=2 --stanza=openpgsql --type=diff 2021-04-06 14:40:34.892 P00 INFO: last backup label = 20210406-143757F, version = 2.32 2021-04-06 14:40:34.892 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_start_backup(): backup begins after the next regular checkpoint completes 2021-04-06 14:40:35.405 P00 INFO: backup start archive = 00000001000000000000005F, lsn = 0/5F000028 2021-04-06 14:40:36.252 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/pg_control (8KB, 99%) checksum 962d11b5c25154c5c8141095be417a7f5d699419 2021-04-06 14:40:36.354 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_logical/replorigin_checkpoint (8B, 100%) checksum 347fc8f2df71bd4436e38bd1516ccd7ea0d46532 2021-04-06 14:40:36.355 P00 INFO: diff backup size = 8KB 2021-04-06 14:40:36.355 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_stop_backup() and wait for all WAL segments to archive 2021-04-06 14:40:36.568 P00 INFO: backup stop archive = 00000001000000000000005F, lsn = 0/5F000100 2021-04-06 14:40:36.573 P00 INFO: check archive for segment(s) 00000001000000000000005F:00000001000000000000005F 2021-04-06 14:40:36.615 P00 INFO: new backup label = 20210406-143757F_20210406-144034D 2021-04-06 14:40:36.672 P00 INFO: backup command end: completed successfully (2528ms) 2021-04-06 14:40:36.672 P00 INFO: expire command begin 2.32: --exec-id=54680-0dd25993 --log-level-console=info --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-full=2 --stanza=openpgsql 2021-04-06 14:40:36.678 P00 INFO: expire command end: completed successfully (6ms)

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest info
stanza: openpgsql
    status: ok
    cipher: none

    db (current)
        wal archive min/max (12): 00000001000000000000005B/00000001000000000000005F

        full backup: 20210406-143652F
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 14:36:52 / 2021-04-06 14:37:10
            wal start/stop: 00000001000000000000005B / 00000001000000000000005B
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 61MB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 8.0MB

        diff backup: 20210406-143757F_20210406-144034D
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 14:40:34 / 2021-04-06 14:40:36
            wal start/stop: 00000001000000000000005F / 00000001000000000000005F
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 8.3KB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 431B
            backup reference list: 20210406-143757F

The ‘info’ command output can be printed in JSON format too, just like below.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest info --output=json [{"archive":[{"database":{"id":1,"repo-key":1},"id":"12-1","max":"00000001000000000000005F","min":"00000001000000000000005B"}],"backup":[{"archive":{"start":"00000001000000000000005B","stop":"00000001000000000000005B"},"backrest":{"format":5,"version":"2.32"},"database":{"id":1,"repo-key":1},"info":{"delta":64047301,"repository":{"delta":8380156,"size":8380156},"size":64047301},"label":"20210406-143652F","prior":null,"reference":null,"timestamp":{"start":1617734212,"stop":1617734230},"type":"full"},{"archive":{"start":"00000001000000000000005D","stop":"00000001000000000000005D"},"backrest":{"format":5,"version":"2.32"},"database":{"id":1,"repo-key":1},"info":{"delta":64047301,"repository":{"delta":8380155,"size":8380155},"size":64047301},"label":"20210406-143757F","prior":null,"reference":null,"timestamp":{"start":1617734277,"stop":1617734285},"type":"full"},{"archive":{"start":"00000001000000000000005F","stop":"00000001000000000000005F"},"backrest":{"format":5,"version":"2.32"},"database":{"id":1,"repo-key":1},"info":{"delta":8459,"repository":{"delta":431,"size":8380156},"size":64047301},"label":"20210406-143757F_20210406-144034D","prior":"20210406-143757F","reference":["20210406-143757F"],"timestamp":{"start":1617734434,"stop":1617734436},"type":"diff"}],"cipher":"none","db":[{"id":1,"repo-key":1,"system-id":6941966298907810297,"version":"12"}],"name":"openpgsql","repo":[{"cipher":"none","key":1,"status":{"code":0,"message":"ok"}}],"status":{"code":0,"lock":{"backup":{"held":false}},"message":"ok"}}][postgres@canttowin ~]$ [postgres@canttowin ~]$

Now next comes the incremental backup, let’s do it!

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --type=incr --log-level-console=info backup 2021-04-06 14:43:26.193 P00 INFO: backup command begin 2.32: --exec-id=55204-d310aa59 --log-level-console=info --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --pg1-port=5432 --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-full=2 --stanza=openpgsql --type=incr 2021-04-06 14:43:26.976 P00 INFO: last backup label = 20210406-143757F_20210406-144034D, version = 2.32 2021-04-06 14:43:26.976 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_start_backup(): backup begins after the next regular checkpoint completes 2021-04-06 14:43:27.495 P00 INFO: backup start archive = 000000010000000000000061, lsn = 0/61000028 2021-04-06 14:43:28.266 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/pg_control (8KB, 99%) checksum 92143d43c90ed770f99f722d734bec62d9413d2a 2021-04-06 14:43:28.369 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_logical/replorigin_checkpoint (8B, 100%) checksum 347fc8f2df71bd4436e38bd1516ccd7ea0d46532 2021-04-06 14:43:28.369 P00 INFO: incr backup size = 8KB 2021-04-06 14:43:28.369 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_stop_backup() and wait for all WAL segments to archive 2021-04-06 14:43:28.872 P00 INFO: backup stop archive = 000000010000000000000061, lsn = 0/61000100 2021-04-06 14:43:28.874 P00 INFO: check archive for segment(s) 000000010000000000000061:000000010000000000000061 2021-04-06 14:43:28.915 P00 INFO: new backup label = 20210406-143757F_20210406-144326I 2021-04-06 14:43:28.977 P00 INFO: backup command end: completed successfully (2785ms) 2021-04-06 14:43:28.977 P00 INFO: expire command begin 2.32: --exec-id=55204-d310aa59 --log-level-console=info --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-full=2 --stanza=openpgsql 2021-04-06 14:43:28.981 P00 INFO: expire command end: completed successfully (4ms) [postgres@canttowin ~]$
[postgres@canttowin ~]$

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest info
stanza: openpgsql
    status: ok
    cipher: none

    db (current)
        wal archive min/max (12): 00000001000000000000005B/000000010000000000000061

        full backup: 20210406-143652F
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 14:36:52 / 2021-04-06 14:37:10
            wal start/stop: 00000001000000000000005B / 00000001000000000000005B
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 61MB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 8.0MB

        diff backup: 20210406-143757F_20210406-144034D
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 14:40:34 / 2021-04-06 14:40:36
            wal start/stop: 00000001000000000000005F / 00000001000000000000005F
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 8.3KB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 431B
            backup reference list: 20210406-143757F

        incr backup: 20210406-143757F_20210406-144326I
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 14:43:26 / 2021-04-06 14:43:28
            wal start/stop: 000000010000000000000061 / 000000010000000000000061
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 8.3KB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 430B
            backup reference list: 20210406-143757F

So, that’s how you can take all three types of backup using the tool, if you want to scchedule it, you can use CRON and do entries something like below.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ crontab -l
#m h   dom mon dow   command
30 06  *   *   0     pgbackrest --type=full --stanza=openpgsql backup
30 06  *   *   1-6   pgbackrest --type=diff --stanza=openpgsql backup

There are some other cool options which you can use with your backup command directly or even mention them in configuration file. There is a long list of parameters which you can use, click here to know about them. Few of them which are very useful are discussed below.

start-fast : Force a checkpoint to start backup quickly.
compress: Use file compression
compress-level: To declare compression levels
repo1-retention-diff: For differential backup retention.

Now, let’s create a recovery scenario. I am going to delete the entire DATA directory from PG HOME and will restore it using backups that we have. This being a brand new cluster, let me create some sample data.

dixit=# dixit=# CREATE TABLE COMPANY( dixit(# ID INT PRIMARY KEY NOT NULL, dixit(# NAME TEXT NOT NULL, dixit(# AGE INT NOT NULL, dixit(# ADDRESS CHAR(50), dixit(# SALARY REAL, dixit(# JOIN_DATE DATE dixit(# ); CREATE TABLE dixit=# INSERT INTO COMPANY (ID,NAME,AGE,ADDRESS,SALARY,JOIN_DATE) VALUES (1, 'Paul', 32, 'California', 20000.00,'2001-07-13'); INSERT 0 1 dixit=# dixit=# INSERT INTO COMPANY (ID,NAME,AGE,ADDRESS,JOIN_DATE) VALUES (2, 'Allen', 25, 'Texas', '2007-12-13'); INSERT 0 1 dixit=# INSERT INTO COMPANY (ID,NAME,AGE,ADDRESS,SALARY,JOIN_DATE) VALUES (3, 'Teddy', 23, 'Norway', 20000.00, DEFAULT ); INSERT 0 1 dixit=# INSERT INTO COMPANY (ID,NAME,AGE,ADDRESS,SALARY,JOIN_DATE) VALUES (4, 'Mark', 25, 'Rich-Mond ', 65000.00, '2007-12-13' ), (5, 'David', 27, 'Texas', 85000.00, '2007-12-13'); INSERT 0 2 dixit=# dixit=# select * from COMPANY; id | name | age | address | salary | join_date ----+-------+-----+----------------------------------------------------+--------+------------ 1 | Paul | 32 | California | 20000 | 2001-07-13 2 | Allen | 25 | Texas | | 2007-12-13 3 | Teddy | 23 | Norway | 20000 | 4 | Mark | 25 | Rich-Mond | 65000 | 2007-12-13 5 | David | 27 | Texas | 85000 | 2007-12-13 (5 rows)

And now when we have made above changes and we have the full database backup taken before than that, we have to take an incremental backup to cover new changes.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --type=incr backup --log-level-console=info 2021-04-06 23:12:18.008 P00 INFO: backup command begin 2.32: --exec-id=80088-57a7eed8 --log-level-console=info --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --pg1-port=5432 --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-diff=2 -–repo1-retention-full=1 --stanza=openpgsql --start-fast --type=incr 2021-04-06 23:12:18.744 P00 INFO: last backup label = 20210406-225743F_20210406-231110I, version = 2.32 2021-04-06 23:12:18.744 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_start_backup(): backup begins after the requested immediate checkpoint completes 2021-04-06 23:12:19.256 P00 INFO: backup start archive = 00000001000000000000006C, lsn = 0/6C000028 2021-04-06 23:12:20.245 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/1249 (440KB, 90%) checksum b85efa460cab148bf9d7db5a3e78dba71cc5b0b2 2021-04-06 23:12:20.247 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/2610 (32KB, 96%) checksum c6331e9df78c639a6b04aed46ecc96bd09f170f6 2021-04-06 23:12:20.250 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global/pg_control (8KB, 98%) checksum e75e69d389d82b2bc9bee88aea6353d3d889c28e 2021-04-06 23:12:20.252 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/2606 (8KB, 99%) checksum 59284824f0a0cd49006d5c220941248b13c2b286 2021-04-06 23:12:20.355 P01 INFO: backup file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_logical/replorigin_checkpoint (8B, 100%) checksum 347fc8f2df71bd4436e38bd1516ccd7ea0d46532 2021-04-06 23:12:20.355 P00 INFO: incr backup size = 488KB 2021-04-06 23:12:20.355 P00 INFO: execute non-exclusive pg_stop_backup() and wait for all WAL segments to archive 2021-04-06 23:12:20.558 P00 INFO: backup stop archive = 00000001000000000000006C, lsn = 0/6C000138 2021-04-06 23:12:20.561 P00 INFO: check archive for segment(s) 00000001000000000000006C:00000001000000000000006C 2021-04-06 23:12:20.591 P00 INFO: new backup label = 20210406-225743F_20210406-231218I 2021-04-06 23:12:20.643 P00 INFO: backup command end: completed successfully (2636ms) 2021-04-06 23:12:20.643 P00 INFO: expire command begin 2.32: --exec-id=80088-57a7eed8 --log-level-console=info --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --repo1-retention-diff=2 --repo1-retention-full=1 --stanza=openpgsql 2021-04-06 23:12:20.649 P00 INFO: expire command end: completed successfully (6ms) [postgres@canttowin ~]$

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest info
stanza: openpgsql
    status: ok
    cipher: none

    db (current)
        wal archive min/max (12): 000000010000000000000068/00000001000000000000006C

        full backup: 20210406-225743F
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 22:57:43 / 2021-04-06 22:58:01
            wal start/stop: 000000010000000000000068 / 000000010000000000000068
            database size: 61MB, database backup size: 61MB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 8.0MB

        incr backup: 20210406-225743F_20210406-231110I
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 23:11:10 / 2021-04-06 23:11:12
            wal start/stop: 00000001000000000000006A / 00000001000000000000006A
            database size: 61.2MB, database backup size: 2.4MB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 239.5KB
            backup reference list: 20210406-225743F

To know more about any of the database backup, we can use option ‘set‘ where we use backup name with ‘info‘ command, just like below.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --set=20210406-225743F_20210406-231110I info
stanza: openpgsql
    status: ok
    cipher: none

    db (current)
        wal archive min/max (12): 000000010000000000000068/00000001000000000000006C

        incr backup: 20210406-225743F_20210406-231110I
            timestamp start/stop: 2021-04-06 23:11:10 / 2021-04-06 23:11:12
            wal start/stop: 00000001000000000000006A / 00000001000000000000006A
            database size: 61.2MB, database backup size: 2.4MB
            repo1: backup set size: 8.0MB, backup size: 239.5KB
            backup reference list: 20210406-225743F
            database list: dixit (16384), kartikey (16385), postgres (14188)

I have removed (did rm -rf *) all files that exists in PG_HOME/base directory, lets restore.

[postgres@canttowin data]$ pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --db-include=dixit --type=immediate --target-action=promote restore --log-level-console=detail 2021-04-06 23:19:12.641 P00 INFO: restore command begin 2.32: --db-include=dixit --exec-id=82229-9187cb59 --log-level-console=detail --pg1-path=/var/lib/pgsql/12/data --repo1-path=/var/lib/pgbackrest --stanza=openpgsql --target-action=promote --type=immediate 2021-04-06 23:19:12.676 P00 INFO: restore backup set 20210406-225743F_20210406-231218I 2021-04-06 23:19:12.677 P00 DETAIL: databases found for selective restore (1, 14187, 14188, 16384, 16385) 2021-04-06 23:19:12.677 P00 DETAIL: check '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data' exists 2021-04-06 23:19:12.678 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.678 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/1' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.678 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14187' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.678 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/log' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_commit_ts' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_dynshmem' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.679 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_logical' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.683 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_logical/mappings' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_logical/snapshots' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_multixact' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_multixact/members' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_multixact/offsets' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_notify' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_replslot' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_serial' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_snapshots' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_stat' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_stat_tmp' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_subtrans' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_tblspc' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_twophase' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_wal' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_wal/archive_status' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.684 P00 DETAIL: create path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_xact' 2021-04-06 23:19:12.879 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/16415 (13.5MB, 22%) checksum d8deb3703748d22554be2fb29c0ed105bab9658c 2021-04-06 23:19:12.957 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/16426 (5MB, 30%) checksum 29a07de6e53a110380ef984d3effca334a07d6e6 2021-04-06 23:19:12.999 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/16423 (2.2MB, 33%) checksum 5184ac361b2bef0df25a34e91636a085fc526930 2021-04-06 23:19:13.000 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/1255 (632KB, 34%) 2021-04-06 23:19:13.057 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/1255 (632KB, 35%) checksum edd483d42330ae26a455b3ee40e5c2b41cb298d5 2021-04-06 23:19:13.065 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14188/1255 (632KB, 36%) checksum fc3c70ab83b8c87e056594f20b2186689d3c4678 2021-04-06 23:19:13.101 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/14187/1255 (632KB, 37%) checksum edd483d42330ae26a455b3ee40e5c2b41cb298d5 2021-04-06 23:19:13.118 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/1/1255 (632KB, 38%) checksum edd483d42330ae26a455b3ee40e5c2b41cb298d5 2021-04-06 23:19:13.119 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/2838 (456KB, 39%) 2021-04-06 23:19:13.127 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/2838 (456KB, 40%) checksum c41dbf11801f153c9bd0493eb6deadd1a3f22333 2021-04-06 23:19:13.133 P01 INFO: restore file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16384/2608 (456KB, 41%) checksum 9de1966f80ac1c0bfa530fa3379e55bfea5936e0 … ….. 2021-04-06 23:19:14.941 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/14043_fsm (24KB, 78%) 2021-04-06 23:19:14.942 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/14038_fsm (24KB, 78%) 2021-04-06 23:19:14.943 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/14033_fsm (24KB, 78%) 2021-04-06 23:19:14.943 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/14028_fsm (24KB, 78%) 2021-04-06 23:19:14.944 P01 DETAIL: restore zeroed file /var/lib/pgsql/12/data/base/16385/14023_fsm (24KB, 78%) …. …… 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_stat_tmp' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_subtrans' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_tblspc' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_twophase' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_wal' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_wal/archive_status' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/pg_xact' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 INFO: restore global/pg_control (performed last to ensure aborted restores cannot be started) 2021-04-06 23:19:17.879 P00 DETAIL: sync path '/var/lib/pgsql/12/data/global' 2021-04-06 23:19:17.883 P00 INFO: restore command end: completed successfully (5243ms) [postgres@canttowin data]$

Perfect, the restore is completed. Let’s start the database cluster.

[postgres@canttowin data]$ cd /usr/pgsql-12/bin/ [postgres@canttowin bin]$ [postgres@canttowin bin]$ /usr/pgsql-12/bin/pg_ctl^C [postgres@canttowin bin]$ [postgres@canttowin bin]$ ./pg_ctl -D /var/lib/pgsql/12/data start waiting for server to start….2021-04-06 23:19:55.212 EDT [82343] LOG: starting PostgreSQL 12.6 on x86_64-pc-linux-gnu, compiled by gcc (GCC) 4.8.5 20150623 (Red Hat 4.8.5-44), 64-bit 2021-04-06 23:19:55.212 EDT [82343] LOG: listening on IPv6 address "::1", port 5432 2021-04-06 23:19:55.212 EDT [82343] LOG: listening on IPv4 address "127.0.0.1", port 5432 2021-04-06 23:19:55.213 EDT [82343] LOG: listening on Unix socket "/var/run/postgresql/.s.PGSQL.5432" 2021-04-06 23:19:55.216 EDT [82343] LOG: listening on Unix socket "/tmp/.s.PGSQL.5432" 2021-04-06 23:19:55.226 EDT [82343] LOG: redirecting log output to logging collector process 2021-04-06 23:19:55.226 EDT [82343] HINT: Future log output will appear in directory "log". done server started

Now let’s connect with the database and see if we still see those records which we inserted.

[postgres@canttowin ~]$ psql -p 5432
psql (12.6.7)
Type "help" for help.

postgres=# SELECT datname FROM pg_database WHERE datistemplate = false;
 datname
----------
 postgres
 dixit
 kartikey
(3 rows)

postgres=# \c dixit
You are now connected to database "dixit" as user "postgres".

dixit=# \d
           List of relations
 Schema |    Name    | Type  |  Owner
--------+------------+-------+----------
 public | company    | table | postgres
 public | department | table | postgres
(2 rows)

dixit=# select * from company;
 id | name  | age |                      address                       | salary | join_date
----+-------+-----+----------------------------------------------------+--------+------------
  1 | Paul  |  32 | California                                         |  20000 | 2001-07-13
  2 | Allen |  25 | Texas                                              |        | 2007-12-13
  3 | Teddy |  23 | Norway                                             |  20000 |
  4 | Mark  |  25 | Rich-Mond                                          |  65000 | 2007-12-13
  5 | David |  27 | Texas                                              |  85000 | 2007-12-13
(5 rows)

dixit=#
dixit=#

Perfect! they are there.

Similarly you can do PITR (point-in-time) backups and restores and even backup and restore any specific database.

Hope It Helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: backup, postgres, postgresql, recovery | Leave a Comment »

How to register remote PEM agents to the PEM Server ?

Posted by FatDBA on April 3, 2021

Hi Guys,

During that quiesce period when I was away from blogging, I worked on lot of stuff, hence lot of contents to share 🙂 …. So here goes my another post. This one is about registering PEM agents with the PEM server as each PEM agent must be registered with the PEM server.

I have this PEM Server already configured (steps for configuring PEM server) and I have this new EDB AS 12 standby server which I would like to add to the PEM monitoring console. let’s get started!

192.168.20.128: PEM Server Host (canttowin.ontadomain)
192.168.20.129: Standby host (canttowinsec.quebecdomain)

I have already installed PEM agent (edb-pem-agent-8.0.1-1.rhel7.x86_64) on this remote standby host, let me show you that.

[root@canttowinsec ~]# yum install edb-pem-agent Loaded plugins: langpacks, ulninfo epel/x86_64/metalink | 7.0 kB 00:00:00 local | 2.9 kB 00:00:00 ol7_UEKR6 | 2.5 kB 00:00:00 ol7_latest | 2.7 kB 00:00:00 percona-release-noarch | 2.9 kB 00:00:00 percona-release-x86_64 | 2.9 kB 00:00:00 prel-release-noarch | 2.9 kB 00:00:00 Package edb-pem-agent-8.0.1-1.rhel7.x86_64 already installed and latest version Nothing to do

Let’s go to the agent home directory and call the configuration utility called ‘pemworker’.

[root@canttowinsec bin]# pwd /usr/edb/pem/agent/bin

[root@canttowinsec bin]# ls pemagent pemworker pkgLauncher

Here we have to use few of the configuration options with their preferred values.
–pem-server : IP Address of the PEM backend database server.
–pem-port : Port of the PEM backend database server, default is 5432, but you have to check what port you have used.
-–pem-user : name of the Database user (having superuser privileges) of the PEM backend database server. This is a mandatory option.
–allow_server_restart: Enable the allow-server_restart parameter to allow PEM to restart the monitored server. TRUE is default.
–allow-batch-probes: Enable the allow-batch-probes parameter to allow PEM to run batch probes on this agent. FALSE is default.
-–batch-script-user: operating system user that should be used for executing the batch/shell scripts. NONE is default.

[root@canttowinsec bin]# ./pemworker --register-agent --pem-server 192.168.20.128 --pem-port 5444 --pem-user enterprisedb --allow_server_restart true --allow-batch-probes true --batch-script-user enterprisedb Postgres Enterprise Manager Agent registered successfully!

Okay, so the agent is successfully registered with the PEM Server. Next we need to add the configuration to the agent.cfg file.

[root@canttowinsec etc]# pwd /usr/edb/pem/agent/etc [root@canttowinsec etc]# ls agent.cfg

I am setting allow_streaming_replication to TRUE as this makes user to configure streaming replication, and next parameter is to provide path of CA certificates.
[root@canttowinsec etc]# echo "allow_streaming_replication=true" >> /usr/edb/pem/agent/etc/agent.cfg [root@canttowinsec etc]# echo "ca_file=/usr/libexec/libcurl-pem/share/certs/ca-bundle.crt" >> /usr/edb/pem/agent/etc/agent.cfg

So, now my agent configuration file will look like below.

[root@canttowinsec etc]# more agent.cfg [PEM/agent] pem_host=192.168.20.128 pem_port=5444
agent_id=2 agent_ssl_key=/root/.pem/agent2.key agent_ssl_crt=/root/.pem/agent2.crt log_level=warning log_location=/var/log/pem/worker.log agent_log_location=/var/log/pem/agent.log long_wait=30 short_wait=10 alert_threads=0 enable_smtp=false enable_snmp=false enable_webhook=false max_webhook_retries=3 allow_server_restart=true max_connections=0 connect_timeout=10 connection_lifetime=0 allow_batch_probes=true heartbeat_connection=false enable_nagios=false batch_script_user=enterprisedb allow_streaming_replication=true ca_file=/usr/libexec/libcurl-pem/share/certs/ca-bundle.crt

Now you will see your PEM agent already added to the PEM agents list under PEM console.

Next you can add your standby database to the list of managed server. Here you need to follow same steps what I have discussed in my last post about PEM configuration, please click here to directly go to that post. The only difference is that you need to select the bounded agent from the drop down list, here you see your new agent coming under drop list, rest all is same!

Once it’s added successfully, you will see the new server under the list, here I have named the connection ‘EDBAS12_Sby‘.

Now here is how the main landing page will look like, new agent and database with its status.

Hope It Helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: edb, pem, postgres, postgresql | Leave a Comment »

How to install EDB-AS without it’s software repositories ?

Posted by FatDBA on April 3, 2021

Hi Everyone,

Many of you might be thinking after reading the title – Why to write about such a simple or rudimentary task, what is so tricky about installing EDB PostgreSQL software ? I know it’s quite easy and straight forward, but only if you are able to add the EDB repository to your server or register it, if you fail to add or register it, then it will be very difficult and becomes a tedious and a time consuming activity to install all of the software’s and their long list of dependencies. This post is all about how to deal with such situation, how to download the source RPMs and install them on the server if you are not able to add the EDB repository.

First step is to download the complete EDB’s tarball, I am downloading the complete tarball here as I don’t want to miss any dependent packages which are needed by the core components. This tarball is close to 1.8 GBs in size, you can download the file using below wget command, here you need to use your EDB credentials.

wget https://prashant.dixit:password@yum.enterprisedb.com/edb/redhat/edb_redhat_rhel-7-x86_64.tar.gz

Now, once the tarball is installed, we can go and create the YUM local repository, though to create YUM repository is optional as you can also install RPMs directly, but will make your work lot easier otherwise you have to look out for dependencies manually. So, I have deceided to create the local repository here.

Once the above file is downloaded, unzip it. You will see list of all core and dependent packages/rpm, just like below.

…. …. edb-pgpool40-4.0.8-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm sslutils_96-1.3-2.rhel7.x86_64.rpm edb-pgpool40-4.0.9-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm wxjson-1.2.1-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm edb-pgpool40-devel-4.0.6-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm wxjson-1.2.1-2.rhel7.x86_64.rpm edb-pgpool40-devel-4.0.8-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm wxjson-devel-1.2.1-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm edb-pgpool40-devel-4.0.9-1.rhel7.x86_64.rpm wxjson-devel-1.2.1-2.rhel7.x86_64.rpm … …

Next I will create a directory which will be used as a repository container.
[root@canttowin edb]# mkdir -p /home/user/repo

move all unzipped files/rpms to this new directory.
[root@canttowin edb]# mv * /home/user/repo

change permissions of the directory.
[root@canttowin edb]# chown -R root.root /home/user/repo [root@canttowin edb]# chmod -R o-w+r /home/user/repo

Now we can go and create the repository, for that we will use ‘createrepo‘ command.
[root@canttowin edb]# createrepo /home/user/repo Spawning worker 0 with 1151 pkgs Workers Finished Saving Primary metadata Saving file lists metadata Saving other metadata Generating sqlite DBs Sqlite DBs complete

Now let’s create the YUM repository entry under /etc/yum.repos.d
[root@canttowin edb]# more /etc/yum.repos.d/myrepo.repo [local] name=Prashant Local EDB Repo baseurl=file:///home/user/repo enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 [root@canttowin edb]#

All set! let’s try to look for any EDB’s package using this new local repository

[root@canttowin ~]# yum search edb-as12-server Loaded plugins: langpacks, ulninfo =============================================================== N/S matched: edb-as12-server ================================================================ edb-as12-server.x86_64 : EnterpriseDB Advanced Server Client and Server Components edb-as12-server-client.x86_64 : The client software required to access EDBAS server. edb-as12-server-cloneschema.x86_64 : cloneschema is a module for EnterpriseDB Advanced Server edb-as12-server-contrib.x86_64 : Contributed source and binaries distributed with EDBAS edb-as12-server-core.x86_64 : The core programs needed to create and run a EnterpriseDB Advanced Server edb-as12-server-devel.x86_64 : EDBAS development header files and libraries edb-as12-server-docs.x86_64 : Extra documentation for EDBAS edb-as12-server-edb-modules.x86_64 : EDB-Modules for EnterpriseDB Advanced Server edb-as12-server-indexadvisor.x86_64 : Index Advisor for EnterpriseDB Advanced Server edb-as12-server-libs.x86_64 : The shared libraries required for any EDBAS clients edb-as12-server-llvmjit.x86_64 : Just-In-Time compilation support for EDBAS edb-as12-server-parallel-clone.x86_64 : parallel_clone is a module for EnterpriseDB Advanced Server edb-as12-server-pldebugger.x86_64 : PL/pgSQL debugger server-side code edb-as12-server-plperl.x86_64 : The Perl procedural language for EDBAS edb-as12-server-plpython.x86_64 : The Python procedural language for EDBAS edb-as12-server-plpython3.x86_64 : The Python3 procedural language for EDBAS edb-as12-server-pltcl.x86_64 : The Tcl procedural language for EDBAS edb-as12-server-sqlprofiler.x86_64 : SQL profiler for EnterpriseDB Advanced Server edb-as12-server-sqlprotect.x86_64 : SQL Protect for EnterpriseDB Advanced Server

Great, so we are now able to look and install all our EDB packages through YUM, it’s lot easier than manually fixing dependencies and install core packages.

Hope It Helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: edb, postgres, postgresql | Leave a Comment »

How to monitor your PostgreSQL databases using EDB PEM – Setup, Config, benchmarking and much more …

Posted by FatDBA on March 26, 2021

Hi Everyone,

Today’s post will be all about monitoring your PostgreSQL database clusters using EDB PostgreSQL Enterprise Manager (PEM). Postgres Enterprise Manager is a comprehensive, customizable solution providing an interface to control and optimize your PostgreSQL deployment.

I will be doing the installation, configuration, adding servers to the console and will perform a live monitoring of the database while I will be generating some synthetic load on the database host. I am doing this on a standalone RHEL 7 64 Bit server which I will be using it both as a PEM server and local instance. Alright, so without further ado, lets start. So, first you need to download EDB’s official repository and install following package.

Below is a complete list of packages available with name ‘edb-pem’, you need to install version: edb-pem-8.0.1-1.rhel7.x86_64

[root@canttowin repo]# yum search edb-pem Loaded plugins: langpacks, ulninfo

=================================================================== N/S matched: edb-pem ==================================================================== edb-pem-debuginfo.x86_64 : Debug information for package edb-pem edb-pem.x86_64 : PostgreSQL Enterprise Manager edb-pem-agent.x86_64 : Postgres Enterprise Manager Agent edb-pem-docs.x86_64 : Documentation for Postgres Enterprise Manager edb-pem-server.x86_64 : PEM Server Components

Once installation is completed, go to the default installation directory, it’s /usr/edb in my case, and go to pem/bin folder.

[root@canttowin ~]# cd /usr/edb/ [root@canttowin edb]# ls as12 bart efm-4.1 jdbc migrationtoolkit pem pgbouncer1.15 pgpool4.2 [root@canttowin ~]# cd /usr/edb/pem/bin/ [root@canttowin bin]# ls configure-pem-server.sh configure-selinux.sh

We see two configuration shell scripts are present, we will be using the configuration script – configure-pem-server.sh
Here I will be choosing option 1 which means I will be installing web services and databases all on one host, next you need to input installation path (/usr/edb/as12 in my case), followed by super user name, port numbers and IP Address of the server.

Before I call the config script, let me quickly reset the default superuser’s password.

postgres=# alter user postgres with password 'dixit'; ALTER ROLE

Now, let’s call the configuration scipt and pass all discussed values.

[root@canttowin bin]# ./configure-pem-server.sh

 -----------------------------------------------------
 EDB Postgres Enterprise Manager
 -----------------------------------------------------
Install type: 1:Web Services and Database, 2:Web Services 3: Database [ ] :1
Enter local database server installation path (i.e. /usr/edb/as12 , or /usr/pgsql-12, etc.) [ ] :/usr/edb/as12
Enter database super user name [ ] :enterprisedb
Enter database server port number [ ] :5444
Enter database super user password [ ] :
Please enter CIDR formatted network address range that agents will connect to the server from, to be added to the server's pg_hba.conf file. For example, 192.168.1.0/24 [ 0.0.0.0/0 ] :10.0.0.153/32
Enter database systemd unit file or init script name (i.e. edb-as-12 or postgresql-12, etc.) [ ] :edb-as-12
Please specify agent certificate path (Script will attempt to create this directory, if it does not exists) [ ~/.pem/ ] :
CREATE EXTENSION
[Info] Configuring database server.
CREATE DATABASE
CREATE ROLE
CREATE ...
..
..
..
CREATE EXTENSION
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Configuring database server.
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] creating role pem
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Generating certificates
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl stop edb-as-12
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Skipping - configurations for /var/lib/edb/as12/data/pg_hba.conf and /var/lib/edb/as12/data/postgresql.conf file
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl start edb-as-12
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Enable pemagent service.
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl enable pemagent
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Stop pemagent service
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl stop pemagent
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Start pemagent service.
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl start pemagent
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Configuring httpd server
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl stop httpd
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Taking backup of /usr/edb/pem/web/pem.wsgi
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Creating /usr/edb/pem/web/pem.wsgi
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Taking backup of /usr/edb/pem/web/config_local.py.
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Generating PEM Cookie Name.
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Creating /usr/edb/pem/web/config_local.py
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Taking backup of /etc/httpd/conf.d/edb-pem.conf
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Creating /etc/httpd/conf.d/edb-pem.conf
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Configuring httpd server sslconf
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Taking backup of /etc/httpd/conf.d/edb-ssl-pem.conf
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Taking backup of /etc/httpd/conf.d/edb-ssl-pem.conf
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing /usr/edb/pem/web/setup.py
Postgres Enterprise Manager - Application Initialisation
========================================================
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Check and Configure SELinux security policy for PEM
 getenforce found, now executing 'getenforce' command
 Configure the httpd to work with the SELinux
 Allow the httpd to connect the database (httpd_can_network_connect_db = on)
 Allow the httpd to connect the network (httpd_can_network_connect = on)
 Allow the httpd to work with cgi (httpd_enable_cgi = on)
 Allow to read & write permission on the 'pem' user home directory
 SELinux policy is configured for PEM
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Executing systemctl start httpd
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] Configured the webservice for EDB Postgres Enterprise Manager (PEM) Server on port '8443'.
-->  [Info] -->  [Info] PEM server can be accessed at https://127.0.0.1:8443/pem at your browser

It’s completed, and at the very end it has provided URL to access the PEM GUI.

Now next step is to install PEM Agents to the server, you need to install it on all servers which you want to monitor, I am leaving the PEMAgents configuration that you do in agent.cfg file.

[root@canttowin bin]# yum install edb-pem-agent

Let’s check the PEM GUI now.

Here on the left panel you will notice there’s already one database present under ‘PEM Server Directory’ folder, this is the same database which we have configured/used PEM server, hence it will be automatically added to the server list. We will manually add one more database cluster to explain how to do it explicitly.

Let’s check the dashboard for the same (PEM Server) database for session, TPS, IO related details.

Now, let’s add another database to the monitoring console. I will be adding a community PostgreSQL 12 database to it. Go to ‘PEM Server Directory’ folder right click on it, choose option create-> server.

Next, fill connection wizard with all details i.e, username, password, IP, port and security related details for the new database and click save at the end.

And you are done!

Now, let’s see the default landing page of PEM GUI and here you see details of all added hosts and agents with their status.

Next I will create some new databases to see how that data reflects in PEM GUI.
postgres=# postgres=# create database dixit; CREATE DATABASE postgres=# create database kartikey; CREATE DATABASE

All good! now let’s do some performance test to see how useful PEM can be in case of performance issues. In order to mimic or simulate the situation, I will generating some synthetic load using PostgreSQL’s default utility Pgbench.

Reference:
-c number of clients
-j 2 number of threads
-t amount of transactions

These values are 10000 transactions per client. So : 10 x 10000 = 100,000 transactions

[postgres@canttowin bin]$ ./pgbench -U postgres -p 5432 -c 10 -j 2 -t 10000 postgres starting vacuum…end.

Let’s see how the changes are captured and presented in PEM.

Okay, we can see the peaks are recorded and presented.

The load is still running and we can clearly see that from the below graph.

[postgres@canttowin bin]$ ./pgbench -U postgres -p 5432 -c 10 -j 2 -t 10000 postgres starting vacuum…end.transaction type: scaling factor: 1 query mode: simple number of clients: 10 number of threads: 2 number of transactions per client: 10000 number of transactions actually processed: 100000/100000 latency average = 18.217 ms tps = 548.940142 (including connections establishing) tps = 548.970173 (excluding connections establishing)

Alright, so the load run has ended, let see how the graph now looks like.

So to conclude, PEM is a great tool which can fulfil all your monitoring needs, it has got some cool features too i.e. performance dashboards, tuning wizards, advisories and other graphs.

Hope It Helped
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: edb, pem, performance, postgres, postgresql | 1 Comment »

How to monitor your PostgreSQL database using Grafana, Prometheus & postgres_exporter.

Posted by FatDBA on March 24, 2021

Hi Everyone,

I am back with the another post, this time it’s for monitoring PostgreSQL database using one of the popular interactive visualization platform Grafana. I have recently implemented Grafana + Prometheus and created few really cool performance charts and database metric dashboards using one of the popular PostgreSQL metric exporter ‘postgres_exporter‘ to monitor a EDB 12 PostgreSQL database cluster.

I have divided everything in to three parts – Grafana Installation & configuration, Prometheus Installation and Configuration and final postgres_exporter installation and configuration.

let’s first start with Grafana installation and configuration on Linux server (this is EL 7).

Grafana Installation:

1. Disable SELinux

Change SELINUX=enforcing to SELINUX=disabled and Reboot.

vi /etc/sysconfig/selinux

2. Now we need to create Grafana YUM repository

vi /etc/yum.repos.d/grafana.repo

and add following lines to it

[grafana] name=grafana baseurl=https://packages.grafana.com/oss/rpm repo_gpgcheck=1 enabled=1 gpgcheck=1 gpgkey=https://packages.grafana.com/gpg.key sslverify=1 sslcacert=/etc/pki/tls/certs/ca-bundle.crt

3. Install Grafana now using YUM

yum install grafana

This will install all binaries to location /usr/sbin/grafana-server, copies init.d file to /etc/init.d/grafana-server and default log location would be /var/log/grafana/grafana.log.

4. Install additional font packages

yum install fontconfig yum install freetype* yum install urw-fonts

5. Now, enable grafana service

Enable Grafana service on system boot
systemctl enable grafana-server.service

Start it using the following command:
systemctl start grafana-server

6. Check Grafana web interface

http://IPADDRESSorHOSTNAME:3000/

Note: Default username and password is ‘admin‘, and once you login, it will prompt you to set a new password.

Add PostgreSQL as Data Source:

Next we now going to add PostgreSQL as a data source in Grafana.

1. Login to Grafana and go to ‘configuration‘ tab on the left of the console.

2. Add PostgreSQL as a data source, populate all details like hostname, port number, database name, DB user and password, PostgreSQL version and some optional entries like connection limits, SSL details etc. Once done, click on button with name save and test to see if all details are fine.

3. Now you will start seeing PostgreSQL as a data source under data source tab.

Prometheus Installation & Config

All good, now next is to install and configure ‘Prometheus’, this is a time-series database that is optimized for storing and serving time series through associated pairs of time(s) and value(s). You can also use InfluxDB or Graphite as a time series database for Grafana.

1. Download and untar the Prometheus file for your respective OS.
Example:
curl -LO url -LO https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/download/v2.22.0/prometheus-2.22.0.linux-amd64.tar.gz tar -xvf prometheus-2.22.0.linux-amd64.tar.gz mv prometheus-2.22.0.linux-amd64 prometheus-files

2. Create prometheus user, directories and make that account owner for all the files and folders.

sudo useradd --no-create-home --shell /bin/false prometheus sudo mkdir /etc/prometheus sudo mkdir /var/lib/prometheus sudo chown prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus sudo chown prometheus:prometheus /var/lib/prometheus

3. Copy prometheus and promtool binaries from prometheus-files to /usr/local/bin and change ownership

sudo cp prometheus-files/prometheus /usr/local/bin/ sudo cp prometheus-files/promtool /usr/local/bin/ sudo chown prometheus:prometheus /usr/local/bin/prometheus sudo chown prometheus:prometheus /usr/local/bin/promtool

4. Move consoles and console_libraries directories from prometheus-files to /etc/prometheus folder and change ownership

sudo cp -r prometheus-files/consoles /etc/prometheus sudo cp -r prometheus-files/console_libraries /etc/prometheus sudo chown -R prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus/consoles sudo chown -R prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus/console_libraries

5. Now time to configure. Create prometheus.yml file

vi /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml

copy below entries to the YAML file

global:
  scrape_interval: 10s

scrape_configs:
  - job_name: 'prometheus'
    scrape_interval: 5s
    static_configs:
      - targets: ['10.0.0.153:9090']

6. Change ownership of this file

sudo chown prometheus:prometheus /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml

7. Create prometheus service file

vi /etc/systemd/system/prometheus.service

copy below entries to the file.

[Unit]
Description=Prometheus
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target

[Service]
User=prometheus
Group=prometheus
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/prometheus \
    --config.file /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml \
    --storage.tsdb.path /var/lib/prometheus/ \
    --web.console.templates=/etc/prometheus/consoles \
    --web.console.libraries=/etc/prometheus/console_libraries

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

8. Register systemd service to register prometheus service and start it.

sudo systemctl daemon-reload sudo systemctl enable prometheus sudo systemctl start prometheus

and check the status of the service

sudo systemctl status prometheus

[root@canttowin edb]# systemctl status prometheus
● prometheus.service - Prometheus
   Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/prometheus.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
   Active: active (running) since Wed 2021-03-24 05:55:53 EDT; 4s ago
 Main PID: 17641 (prometheus)
    Tasks: 7
   CGroup: /system.slice/prometheus.service
           └─17641 /usr/local/bin/prometheus --config.file /etc/prometheus/prometheus.yml --storage.tsdb.path /var/lib/prometheus/ --web.console.templates...

Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.172Z caller=head.go:714 component=tsdb msg="WAL segment ...gment=10
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.358Z caller=head.go:714 component=tsdb msg="WAL segment ...gment=10
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.455Z caller=head.go:714 component=tsdb msg="WAL segment ...gment=10
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.456Z caller=head.go:714 component=tsdb msg="WAL segment ...gment=10
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.456Z caller=head.go:719 component=tsdb msg="WAL replay c...173255ms
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.478Z caller=main.go:732 fs_type=XFS_SUPER_MAGIC
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.478Z caller=main.go:735 msg="TSDB started"
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.478Z caller=main.go:861 msg="Loading configuration file"...heus.yml
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.481Z caller=main.go:892 msg="Completed loading of configuration …µs
Mar 24 05:55:54 canttowin.ontadomain prometheus[17641]: level=info ts=2021-03-24T09:55:54.481Z caller=main.go:684 msg="Server is ready to receive ...quests."
Hint: Some lines were ellipsized, use -l to show in full.

9. If no issues till here, you are all good, time to check Prometheus WEB GUI, you can access its using below URL.

http://10.0.0.153:9090/graph

10. You can check other stats and other available metrics via GUI console.

11. Now you will start seeing ‘Prometheus’ in the list of data sources along with PostgreSQL which we have added at the first step.

Postgres_Exporter Installation and configuration

Now, when Grafana and Prometheus is all set, time to install and configure postgres_exporter. Postgres_exporter is a popular PostgreSQL metric exporter for Prometheus.

1. Lets create few required directories first.

mkdir /opt/postgres_exporter cd /opt/postgres_exporter

2. Download and untar the file.

wget https://github.com/wrouesnel/postgres_exporter/releases/download/v0.5.1/postgres_exporter_v0.5.1_linux-amd64.tar.gz tar -xzvf postgres_exporter_v0.5.1_linux-amd64.tar.gz cd postgres_exporter_v0.5.1_linux-amd64

3. Copy core file ‘postgres_exporter’ file to /usr/local/bin directory

cp postgres_exporter /usr/local/bin

4. Next, lets create the configuration file for postres_exporter

cd /opt/postgres_exporter sudo vi postgres_exporter.env

I want to visualize my EDB 12 PostgreSQL stats, so will use below data source details. This is for all database, you can also monitor any specific database.

[root@canttowin edb]# more /opt/postgres_exporter/postgres_exporter.env DATA_SOURCE_NAME="postgresql://enterprisedb:oracle@10.0.0.153:5444/?sslmode=disable"

5. Next, create the service for postgres_exporter

vi /etc/systemd/system/postgres_exporter.service

put below lines to the service file

[Unit] Description=Prometheus exporter for Postgresql Wants=network-online.target After=network-online.target [Service] User=postgres Group=postgres WorkingDirectory=/opt/postgres_exporter EnvironmentFile=/opt/postgres_exporter/postgres_exporter.env ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/postgres_exporter Restart=always [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

6. Next enable service and check status

sudo systemctl daemon-reload sudo systemctl start postgres_exporter sudo systemctl enable postgres_exporter

[root@canttowin edb]# systemctl status postgres_exporter
● postgres_exporter.service - Prometheus exporter for Postgresql
   Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/postgres_exporter.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
   Active: active (running) since Wed 2021-03-24 05:52:17 EDT; 2s ago
 Main PID: 16984 (postgres_export)
    Tasks: 3
   CGroup: /system.slice/postgres_exporter.service
           └─16984 /usr/local/bin/postgres_exporter --web.listen-address=:9187 --web.telemetry-path=/metrics

Mar 24 05:52:17 canttowin.ontadomain systemd[1]: Started Prometheus exporter for Postgresql.
Mar 24 05:52:17 canttowin.ontadomain postgres_exporter[16984]: time="2021-03-24T05:52:17-04:00" level=info msg="Established new database connection...go:777"
Mar 24 05:52:17 canttowin.ontadomain postgres_exporter[16984]: time="2021-03-24T05:52:17-04:00" level=info msg="Semantic Version Changed on \"10.0....o:1229"
Mar 24 05:52:18 canttowin.ontadomain postgres_exporter[16984]: time="2021-03-24T05:52:18-04:00" level=info msg="Starting Server: :9187" source="pos...o:1437"
Hint: Some lines were ellipsized, use -l to show in full.

7. Now we can check status if postgres_exporter (as a target) state information and other details. This we can check it through Prometheus web GUI.

As we have configured postgres_exporter and mapped it with Prometheus, we can also look for many of the expressions that it has created. This you can access on ‘graph’ page under Prometheus GUI console.

You can check it’s immediate results in both graphical or in console itself.

Alright, we have installed and configured Grafana and have added PostgreSQL and Prometheus as a data source and have configured postgres_exporter metric collector too. Time to generate some graphs. Well, you can do it by creating manual queries under new dashboards or else you can use any of prebuild Grafana dashboard templates for PostgreSQL i.e. 6742 or even 9628 (there are many more on Grafana labs repo).

1. Lets Import dashboard with ID 6742. Go to option with + sign on the left panel and choose last option ‘import’.

2. In next screen, pass dashboard ID 6742 and press button Load. You can also use JSON file entries instead of ID, I will use ID here in this sample configuration. Here select ‘Prometheus’ from the drop down list and click ‘Import’ and it’s all set!

3. Now this will bring the final dashboard showing lot’s of PostgreSQL metrics and their current values.

Hope It Helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: devops, monitoring, performance, postgres, postgresql | Leave a Comment »

Display SQLID for a statement, no need to use Dynamic Views …

Posted by FatDBA on March 22, 2021

Hi Guys,

I have been busy lately, so couldn’t write much, but I have few things which I will be soon sharing in the form of blog posts, so stay tuned! Alright, so this one is about one of the feature which was though introduced in Oracle 18c, but I first tried it on 19c while doing a recent migration (few stories from that episode too!) – This is to display the SQLID for the currently executed SQL/PLSQL’s.

It’s pretty simple and a really cool feature, so, now you need not to query V$SQL, V$SQLAREA or even V$SESSION to get the SQLID of the last SQL. You only need to set the ‘SET FEEDBACK ON SQL_ID‘ and it’s done, it will first execute your statement and will display the SQLID at the end.

Let me show how to get that, I am doing this test on Oracle 19.3.0.0.0.

SQL>
SQL> SET FEEDBACK ON SQL_ID
SQL>
SQL> select name, open_mode, DBID, database_role from v$database;

NAME      OPEN_MODE                  DBID DATABASE_ROLE
--------- -------------------- ---------- ----------------
DIXITDB   READ WRITE            805967680 PRIMARY

1 row selected.

SQL_ID: buv1x6g781ug2
SQL>

Hope It Helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: oracle | Leave a Comment »

repmgr failover done, but where is my Standby ?

Posted by FatDBA on December 15, 2020

Hey Guys,

Last weekend I’ve got a call from one of my friend asking about a weird issue in his master-slave (primary-standby) setup where he’s using repmgr for automatic failover and switchover operations. He said after the failover (server crashed) with role reversal or promotion the old standby becomes new primary (expected, all good till here), but as soon as the old primary comes back online and rejoins the configuration, it started as a primary too. I mean you can imagine something like below, both of the two hosts becomes master and there is no sign of a new standby.


[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ repmgr -f /etc/repmgr.conf cluster show

 ID | Name  | Role    | Status    | Upstream | Location | Connection string
----+-------+---------+-----------+----------+----------+-----------------------------------------
 1  | node1 | primary | * running |          | default  | host=db_node1 dbname=repmgr user=repmgr
 2  | node2 | primary |   running |          | default  | host=db_node2 dbname=repmgr user=repmgr

He checked repmgr logs on the standby node and everything looks okay, standby promotion was sucessfull. It seems something was stopping the repmgr to update the information and bring that crashed node (previous primary) back as a standby. So the final situation is there are two primary nodes at this point.

So, how to and where to start from ?
A quick solution to this problem is to create an UPDATE TRIGGER on one of the internal table EVENTS of repmgr database (it creates its own database with default name of repmgr). The logic of creating a trigger is to handle events “standby_promote”, I mean when it happens a script is triggered that will bring back the old primary as new standby.

Next we would be needing a script that will help to automate the standby promotion. For that purpose you can use this script (link) or you can write something similar. And now when we have to call a bash script or to write stored procedures in a shell, we need the ‘.plsh’ extension in the database. Let’s install one of the most popular extension to do that, petere/plsh (link)


[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ cd /usr/share/postgresql/12/extension/
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ sudo git clone https://github.com/petere/plsh.git
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ cd plsh
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ sudo make PG_CONFIG=/usr/bin/pg_config
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ sudo apt-get install make
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ sudo apt-get install gcc
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ sudo apt-get install postgresql-server-dev-12
[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ sudo make install PG_CONFIG=/usr/bin/pg_config

Now, next create the extension in the database.


[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ psql -U repmgr

This one needs to be executed only n primary side.


repmgr=# create extension plsh;

Now, let’s create the function and a trigger to invoke the script failover_promote.sh


[postgresdb@fatdba ~]$ psql
postgres=# CREATE FUNCTION failover_promote() RETURNS trigger AS $$
#!/bin/sh
/bin/bash /tmp/psqlscripts/failover_promote.sh $1 $2
$$
LANGUAGE plsh;

And the UPDATE TRIGGER on EVENTS table to call function created above.


postgres=#  create trigger failover
after insert
on events
for each row
execute procedure failover_promote();

Yes, that’s it. All done!
Now you can mimic the failover scenario i.e by stopping the primary database and check repmgr logs on the standby server.
You will see the standby is promoted and becomes new primary and as soon it’s finished, it will start pinging the crashed node and the moment it is back it will be promoted as a new standby.

Hope It helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: postgresql, replication, troubleshooting | Leave a Comment »

DDL generation in PostgreSQL & a TRICK …

Posted by FatDBA on December 3, 2020

Hi Guys,

One of my friend recently asked if there is any way to get DDL of all objects that exists inside a schema in PostgreSQL without using any third party tools, something similar like dbms_metadata what we have in Oracle. Though it sounds trivial, but it’s not and this indeed an interesting question. I mean if you have to collect DDL for an Index, View, constraint, trigger or a function you have predefined/in-build PostgreSQL functions (pg_get_*def) and it will be easy to get the structure, but what if you want DDL of a Table, sequence or a type (There few more) ?

You might be thinking of doing concatenations or by doing some coding, and yes that can be done but that will be tricky and complicated. So there isn’t any direct way of generating definitions of said objects, but here comes the PG_DUMP utility for the rescue, you can take the dump of the entire schema and redirect its output in to a SQL file and you can get all your DDLs from the dump file.

Let’s do some hands on, I am on EDB PostgreSQL Version 10.12.20.


[enterprisedb@fatdba ~]$ psql
psql.bin (10.12.20)
Type "help" for help.

enterprisedb=# set search_path=migr;
SET
enterprisedb=# \dtsvi+
                                                               List of relations
 Schema |            Name             |   Type   |    Owner     |         Table          |    Size    |              Description
--------+-----------------------------+----------+--------------+------------------------+------------+----------------------------------------
 migr   | audits                      | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 0 bytes    |
 migr   | audits_audit_id_seq         | sequence | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | audits_pkey                 | index    | enterprisedb | audits                 | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | bar                         | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | bar_pk                      | index    | enterprisedb | bar                    | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | bigtab                      | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 944 kB     |
 migr   | bigtab1                     | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 112 kB     |
 migr   | bigtab1_vw                  | view     | enterprisedb |                        | 0 bytes    |
 migr   | foo                         | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | foo_bar                     | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | foo_pk                      | index    | enterprisedb | foo                    | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | i_mlog$_bar                 | index    | enterprisedb | mlog$_bar              | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | i_mlog$_foo                 | index    | enterprisedb | mlog$_foo              | 8192 bytes |
 migr   | mlog$_bar                   | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes | snapshot log for master table MIGR.BAR
 migr   | mlog$_foo                   | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes | snapshot log for master table MIGR.FOO
 migr   | person_address_details      | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 40 kB      |
 migr   | person_address_details_pkey | index    | enterprisedb | person_address_details | 16 kB      |
 migr   | person_info                 | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 40 kB      |
 migr   | person_info_pkey            | index    | enterprisedb | person_info            | 16 kB      |
 migr   | trigger_test                | table    | enterprisedb |                        | 8192 bytes |
(20 rows)

This is how you can generate DDL’s for your views, Indexes and others.


enterprisedb=# select pg_get_viewdef('bigtab1_vw'::regclass, true);
           pg_get_viewdef
------------------------------------
  SELECT bigtab1.id,               +
     bigtab1.created_date,         +
     bigtab1.lookup_id,            +
     bigtab1.data                  +
    FROM bigtab1                   +
   WHERE bigtab1.id > 950::numeric;
(1 row)
                           
enterprisedb=#  select pg_get_indexdef('person_address_details_pkey'::regclass);
                                                pg_get_indexdef
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 CREATE UNIQUE INDEX person_address_details_pkey ON migr.person_address_details USING btree (person_address_id)
(1 row)

Let’s take a pg_dump backup of this schema and will look out for table and other object definitions.


[enterprisedb@fatdba dumpddl]$ pg_dump --schema migr > migr_ddl.sql
[enterprisedb@fatdba dumpddl]$
[enterprisedb@fatdba dumpddl]$ ls -ltrh
total 728K
-rw-rw-r--. 1 enterprisedb enterprisedb 728K Nov 10 11:34 migr_ddl.sql


[enterprisedb@fatdba dumpddl]$ more migr_ddl.sql |grep -A 5 --color 'CREATE TABLE'
CREATE TABLE migr.audits (
    audit_id bigint NOT NULL,
    table_name character varying(255),
    transaction_name character varying(10),
    by_user character varying(30),
    transaction_date timestamp without time zone
--
CREATE TABLE migr.bar (
    foo numeric NOT NULL,
    bar numeric NOT NULL
);


--
CREATE TABLE migr.bigtab (
    id numeric(12,6),
    v1 character varying(10),
    padding character varying(50)
);

--
CREATE TABLE migr.bigtab1 (
    id numeric(10,0),
    created_date timestamp without time zone,
    lookup_id numeric(10,0),
    data character varying(50)
);
--
CREATE TABLE migr.foo (
    foo numeric NOT NULL
);


ALTER TABLE migr.foo OWNER TO enterprisedb;
--
CREATE TABLE migr.foo_bar (
    foo numeric,
    bar numeric,
    foo_rowid rowid,
    bar_rowid rowid
);
--
CREATE TABLE migr."mlog$_bar" (
    "m_row$$" character varying(255),
    "snaptime$$" timestamp without time zone,
    "dmltype$$" character varying(1),
    "old_new$$" character varying(1),
    "change_vector$$" bytea(255),
--
CREATE TABLE migr."mlog$_foo" (
    "m_row$$" character varying(255),
    "snaptime$$" timestamp without time zone,
    "dmltype$$" character varying(1),
    "old_new$$" character varying(1),
    "change_vector$$" bytea(255),
--
CREATE TABLE migr.person_address_details (
    person_address_id numeric(5,0) NOT NULL,
    person_id numeric(5,0),
    city character varying(15),
    state character varying(15),
    country character varying(20),
--
CREATE TABLE migr.person_info (
    person_id numeric(5,0) NOT NULL,
    first_name character varying(20),
    last_name character varying(20)
);

--
CREATE TABLE migr.trigger_test (
    id numeric NOT NULL,
    description character varying(50) NOT NULL
);

So, we finally got the DDL of tables and all objects inside the schema.

Hope It helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: administration, postgres | Leave a Comment »

Thanks Percona for this great product called PMM (Percona Monitoring & Management Server)

Posted by FatDBA on December 2, 2020

Hi Guys,

For one of our customer we recently moved from on-prem to AWS cloud and we moved our entire infrastructure along with our MySQL & PostgreSQL Clusters. The very next question that started bothering us is to look out for any solid, stable and reliable monitoring and performance management tool, and then we learned about Percona’s Monitoring & Management Server (PMM).

After trying the setup we are pretty satisfied with it’s performance as it fulfils all our expectations from any monitoring tool to monitor our applications and databases. We found the product best in terms of Cost (comes with an hourly price of only $ 0.10/hr), highly secure (with SSL encryption) and offers some really cool and smart features.
There are many features what it offers, but being a long time Performance Consultant (DBA) I personally found the ‘Query Analytics’ section more useful and impressive. It has got everything what you need to know for your real-time workload, it provides an in-depth analysis of your queries i.e. execution plan, latency information, query fingerprints etc. This can provide very useful at the time when you have any problem in hand and want to deep dive in and want to know what all is going on with your system at the statement level.

It has got great integration with Grafana platform too, great data visualizations in the form of dashboards etc.

I will recommend this tool for people who are looking for any good stable monitoring platform along with performance administration tool. Not only for PostgreSQL & MySQL but it’s available for other platforms too like Amazon RDS MySQL, Amazon Aurora MySQL, MongoDB, Percona XtraDB Cluster and ProxySQL.

It’s available on both AWS and Azure markets.

Link to AWS Marketplace : https://aws.amazon.com/marketplace/pp/B077J7FYGX?qid=1605533229523&sr=0-1&ref_=srh_res_product_title

Link to Azure Marketplace: https://azuremarketplace.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/apps/percona.pmm_2?tab=Overview

Hope It Helped!

Prashant Dixit

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: administration, monitoring, performance | Leave a Comment »

Oracle Classic EXP/IMP and Data Pump possible with Oracle Instant Clients on Linux, starting from 12.2.0.1 …

Posted by FatDBA on November 25, 2020

Hi Guys,

I have just noticed that few of the DBAs and most of the developers doesn’t know that starting from Oracle Instant client version 12.2.0.1, you can now use few of the useful utilities like EXPORT, IMPORT, DATAPUMP, SQL Loader, workload replay clients for Oracle RAT etc. You only need to download the Instant Client for Linux x86_64 (instantclient-tools) that has an additional package called ‘Tools’.
This was earlier not possible on systems where you do not have the proper/complete Oracle database installation i.e. Oracle clients installations (It was there with full client installations but not with Instant clients). This is very useful for your developers who want to take table level database backups using traditional utilities like export/import or new data pump.

It’s quite easy to install too, you just need to unzip the software and set few of the environmental variables and you are all set.
Let’s assume you have downloaded the package and unzipped, let’s set the environmental variables next.


#export PATH
export ORACLE_HOME=/home/oracle/app/oracle/product/12.1.0/client_1/
export TNS_ADMIN=$ORACLE_HOME/network/admin
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$ORACLE_HOME/lib:
export PATH=$ORACLE_HOME/bin:$PATH

Okay, we are all set, let’s try to call the classic export (EXP) utility and see how it goes.


[oracle@orainst2-test-monkey01 ~]$ exp

Export: Release 12.2.0.1.0 - Production on Wed Nov 25 12:44:24 2020

Copyright (c) 1982, 2017, Oracle and/or its affiliates.  All rights reserved.

Username:

Great, it worked. Now, let’s try to take a backup.


[oracle@orainst2-test-monkey01 ~]$ exp TESTUSER/XXXXXXXX@(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=XXXXXXX)(PORT=XXX))(CONNECT_DATA=(SERVICE_NAME=orainstST))) 
TABLES=TEST_TABLE1, TEST_TABLE2 FILE=/u01/app/testdb/dbc/backups/testdb_pdtest.dmp

Export: Release 12.2.0.1.0 - Production on Wed Nov 25 12:44:51 2020

Copyright (c) 1982, 2017, Oracle and/or its affiliates.  All rights reserved.

Connected to: Oracle Database 12c Enterprise Edition Release 12.2.0.1.0 - 64bit Production
With the Partitioning, OLAP, Data Mining and Real Application Testing options
......
Estimate in progress using BLOCKS method...
Processing object type DATABASE_EXPORT/SCHEMA/TABLE/TABLE_DATA
Total estimation using BLOCKS method: 250.8 MB
Processing object type DATABASE_EXPORT/SCHEMA/TABLE/TABLE
Processing object type DATABASE_EXPORT/SCHEMA/TABLE/TABLE_DATA
. . exported "TESTUSER"."TEST_TABLE1"                              190.9 MB       4819123 rows
.........
...

Hope It Helped!
Prashant Dixit

Posted in Basics | Tagged: oracle | Leave a Comment »

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Thanks Percona for this great product called PMM (Percona Monitoring & Management Server)

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