I have been using PostgreSQL for a GIS database on different Linux (mostly SuSE 8.1) boxes, and so far everything fine.
Now I tried to set up a "bigger" database server (HP ProLiant DL 380-G3, 2x Intel Pentium4-Xeon, 2.8 GHz 4 GB memory and a RAID 5 system with ca. 500 GB diskspace) under SuSE 8.1
When compiling PostgreSQL 7.3.4, (GNU Make version 3.79.1) everything went fine. Then I wanted to set up several database instances and fill them from SQL dumps (1 ...1.5 GB each) and lots of indices (btree and rtree).
I monitored the filling process. When reading data, all was fine. When setting up the indices after reading the data, I managed to crash the system (?!) several times (not regularly, but mostly related with heavy load on the box (e.g. zipping large files while filling the databases). Normally, this should result only in slowing down the machine (may be VERY slow) but I see the postmaster processes lose CPU percentage while the system load (xload) even increases until everything (not only the database) is blocked.
When doing the same things for our older Athlon single-processor boxes, everything went slowly, but fine
a) The dumps come from 7.1.3 databases. This should not be any problem, I think.
b) Normally, I would expect only the application (i.e. the database to crash, but not the system.
c) Do I run into some multiprocessor problems? Missed some compiler option providing thread-safe processing?
Is there anybody who can give me some hint on fixing the problem? Any help will be greatly appreciated.
Regards,
Hubert
-- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr.-Ing. Hubert Fröhlich Bezirksfinanzdirektion München Alexandrastr. 3, D-80538 München, GERMANY Tel. :+49 (0)89 / 2190 - 2980 Fax :+49 (0)89 / 2190 - 2459 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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