Merlin Moncure <mmonc...@gmail.com> writes: > Due to unfortunate environmental conditions (don't ask) I've been > trying to get postgres 9.0 up and running on a fairly ancient linux -- > redhat EL 3 which as kernel 2.4.21. initdb borks on the create > database step with the error message "child process exited with error > code 139". A bit of tracing revealed the exit was happening at the > pg_flush_data which basically wraps posix_fadvise. Disabling fadvise > support in pg_config_manual.h fixed the problem.
> Things brings up a couple of questions: > *) Are linuxes this old out of support? RHEL3 is just about dead as far as Red Hat is concerned: only critical security bugs will be addressed, and even that is going to stop in a year or two. RH would certainly not recommend that you be trying to put any new applications on that platform. > *) Should configure be testing for working posix_fadvise? There isn't any reliable way to do that at configure time, I think. We could add an AC_TRY_RUN call but it wouldn't be trustworthy; think cross-compiles, or running on some other kernel version than where you compiled. Unless the problem manifests on some not-quite-so-dead platform, I'm not in favor of it. regards, tom lane -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers