Re: BUG #13876: pg_xlogdump give an error on timeline switch

>
> (please don't top post on postgres lists)
>

Top posting... sorry, I blame GMail defaults... and mobile phones. :-/


If pg_xlogdump were a tool aimed at normal endusers, maybe. But it's
> clearly not, so ...
>
> What are you using pg_xlogdump for?
>

The issue came about as one of our other DBA's did a role swap
Primary/Standby, but didn't have the recovery_target_timeline = 'latest'
set.  He couldn't figure out why the old Primary (now a Standby) wouldn't
follow the new Primary onto the new timeline, and deduced it was a corrupt
WAL due to the output of pg_xlogdump.

I can understand his confusion, as the error is quite alarming with that
big "FATAL:"... but ultimately, yes, it was our own mistake that led us
down this avenue of investigation


The timeline switch will often happen on a different machine, so you
> can't just do that.
>

It's not a huge issue that I doubt we'll ever have again, but if it was an
oversight and easy to fix then I thought it would be worthwhile doing, so
as to stop others having the same problem.

Cheers.
Greg