Re: archive_command vs. cp -i

"Martin Münstermann"<mmuenst@gmx.de> wrote:

> while setting up a new linux postgresql server, I checked my
> archive_command.  I noticed that the usual "cp -i f1 f2 <
> /dev/null" did NOT as expected:  It did not overwrite the file
> (PASS), but it returned zero (FAIL, should return error).
>
> This could be reproduced on CentOS 5.6, RHEL4, and Ubuntu 10.04.

I've confirmed on SLES 10 and Ubuntu 9, too.

> Should the BACKUP-ARCHIVING-WAL doc be changed?

I think so.  Given the wide variety of platforms on which the
example could silently cause data loss, I *really* don't think we
want that in our docs.  Someone could blithely copy it into
production without testing and not know they had it wrong until a
backup failed to restore.

-Kevin