Re: Block-level CRC checks

On Fri, Oct 3, 2008 at 3:36 PM, Brian Hurt <bhurt@janestcapital.com> wrote:
> OK, I have a stupid question- torn pages are a problem, but only during
> recovery.  Recovery is (I assume) a fairly rare condition- if data
> corruption is going to happen, it's most likely to happen during normal
> operation.  So why not just turn off CRC checksumming during recovery, or at
> least treat it as a much less critical error?  During recovery, if the CRC
> checksum matches, we can assume the page is good- not only not corrupt, but
> not torn either.  If the CRC checksum doesn't match, we don't panic, but
> maybe we do more careful analysis of the page to make sure that only the
> hint bits are wrong.  Or maybe not.  It's only during normal operation that
> a CRC checksum failure would be considered critical.

Well:
1. database half-writes the page X to disk, and there is power outage.
2. we regain the power
2. during recovery database replay all WAL-logged pages.  The X page
was not WAL-logged, thus it is not replayed.
3. when replaying is finished, everything looks OK at this point
4. user runs a SELECT which hits page X.  Oops, we have a checksum
mismatch.
 Best regards,    Dawid Kuroczko
--  ..................        ``The essence of real creativity is a certain: *Dawid Kuroczko* :         playfulness, a
flittingfrom idea to idea: qnex42@gmail.com :     without getting bogged down by fixated demands.''`..................'
Sherkaner Underhill, A Deepness in the Sky, V. Vinge