Re: Out of space situation and WAL log pre-allocation (was

Tom Lane wrote:
> Joe Conway <mail@joeconway.com> writes:
>>Maybe specify an archive location (that of course could be on a separate 
>>partition) that the external archiver should check in addition to the 
>>normal WAL location. At some predetermined interval, push WAL log 
>>segments no longer needed to the archive location.
> 
> Does that really help?  The panic happens when you fill the "normal" and
> "archive" partitions, how's that different from one partition?

I see your point. But it would allow you to use a relatively modest 
local partition for WAL segments, while you might be using a 1TB netapp 
tray over NFS for the archive segments. I guess if the archive partition 
fills up, I would err on the side of dropping archive segments on the 
floor. That would mean a new full backup would be needed, but at least 
it wouldn't result in a corrupt, or shut down, database.

Joe