Re: Problem:- createdb: could not connect to database postgres: could not connect to server: No such file or directory

On Sat, 12 Apr 2008 10:57:28 +0530, Jaisen N.D. wrote:

> Hai, I use Debian Etch. I have a problem with postgresql 8.1. I have
> uninstalled the postgresql-8.3, which I was took from debian back ports,
> removed its configuration files, and the user postgres also. Then
> installed postgresql-8.1. But when I started to create a database, it
> shows some message like this..
> Here is the output I got:-
> -----------------------------------------------------
> localhost:/home/user# su - postgres
> postgres@localhost:~$ /usr/lib/postgresql/8.1/bin/initdb -D
> /var/lib/postgresql/data
> The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user
> "postgres".
> This user must also own the server process.
>
> The database cluster will be initialized with locale en_IN. The default
> database encoding has accordingly been set to UTF8.
>
> initdb: directory "/var/lib/postgresql/data" exists but is not empty If
> you want to create a new database system, either remove or empty the
> directory "/var/lib/postgresql/data" or run initdb with an argument
> other than "/var/lib/postgresql/data". postgres@localhost:~$
> /usr/lib/postgresql/8.1/bin/pg_ctl -D /var/lib/postgresql/data -l
> logfile start postmaster starting
> postgres@localhost:~$ /usr/lib/postgresql/8.1/bin/createdb test
> createdb: could not connect to database postgres: could not connect to
> server: No such file or directory
>         Is the server running locally and accepting connections on Unix
>         domain socket
> "/var/run/postgresql/.s.PGSQL.5432"?
> postgres@localhost:~$
> ----------------------------------------------------- Why it can't
> connect to server? How can I resolve it??

Debian uses /var/lib/postgresql/$pgversion/$clustername to store its
clusters. It doesn't use /var/lib/postgresql/data as far as I know. So I
suggest you move it aside and try again.

You should really be using the pg_createcluster command however. Then you
will have a cluster correctly located so that Debian's initscripts will
start and stop the server at startup and shutdown.

You can also use pg_lsclusters to see what clusters (if any) were left
behind by your previous install of 8.3.

Finally, I suggest you read /usr/share/doc/postgresql-common/
README.Debian.gz for an overview of how the Debian packages of postgresql
integrate with the rest of the system.

--
Sam Morris
http://robots.org.uk/

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