Re: Postgres installation on Leopard; database on Mac-User-Level

Stefan Schwarzer wrote:
> Hi there,
>
> I want to create my database not under /etc/.... but under or within my
> Mac-user level, that is /Users/schwarzer/....

The data directory shouldn't ever end up in /etc - are you sure that's
what it's doing?

> Now, it seems somewhat complicated - at least for me -, due to the
> different read-write permissions, to do that. It worked before, but now,
> after re-installing the machine, I really don't get it going...
>
> The commands would be like this:
>
>     /usr/local/pgsql/bin/initdb -D /Users/schwarzer/Documents/data_postgres
>     /usr/local/pgsql/bin/postmaster -D
> /Users/schwarzer/Documents/data_postgres >logfile 2>&1 &
>
> But, what about the user "schwarzer" and the user "postgres"? How should
> it correctly be installed/configured?

Well, the main thing to remember is that the database server needs to
have read+write access to the data directory (and log directory) but
no-one else needs to. So:
   cd /Users/schwarzer/Documents
   chown postgres:postgres data_postgres
   chmod 0700 data_postgres
(you might also need to check that PG can cd to each directory in the
path too:)
   chmod a+x /Users/schwarzer/Documents
   chmod a+x /Users/schwarzer

There's no reason why you *have* to run the server as user postgres
though. It's perfectly possible to do the above as user schwarzer. If
the database system is intended just for that one user, that might make
sense too.

Oh, make sure the logfile is in a directory writable by the same user
too of course.

--
   Richard Huxton
   Archonet Ltd