> > * Question > > By using Statistics Import and Export feature, is it possible to achieve > the above request by following procedure? > > > > (1) Export the statistics from production environment by using pg_dump > --statistics-only. > > (2) On the staging environment, set the autovacuum related parameters to > prevent autovacuum from running. > > (3) Import the statistics to staging environment by using the result of > (1). >
This was one of the initial intended uses for the statistical import functions, specifically the pg_set_(relation|attribute)_stats variants. Those variants have gone away, but the main functional difference was that pg_restore_relation_stats() did inplace updates (it no longer does), and without that difference set- variants became redundant. So your procedure should still work so long as those statistics remain in place, but just for explain plan generation of queries in isolation - there is no way through statistics to make a large production query that overflows work_mem do the same on a small test database, or other effects that are a consequence of finding real data in the tables.
