On Thu, Dec 29, 2011 at 4:44 PM, Kevin Grittner <kevin.gritt...@wicourts.gov> wrote: >> Heikki Linnakangas wrote: >> On 28.12.2011 01:39, Simon Riggs wrote: >>> On Tue, Dec 27, 2011 at 8:05 PM, Heikki Linnakangas >>> wrote: >>>> On 25.12.2011 15:01, Kevin Grittner wrote: >>>>> >>>>> I don't believe that. Double-writing is a technique to avoid >>>>> torn pages, but it requires a checksum to work. This chicken- >>>>> and-egg problem requires the checksum to be implemented first. >>>> >>>> I don't think double-writes require checksums on the data pages >>>> themselves, just on the copies in the double-write buffers. In >>>> the double-write buffer, you'll need some extra information per- >>>> page anyway, like a relfilenode and block number that indicates >>>> which page it is in the buffer. > > You are clearly right -- if there is no checksum in the page itself, > you can put one in the double-write metadata. I've never seen that > discussed before, but I'm embarrassed that it never occurred to me.
Heikki's idea for double writes works well. It solves the problems of torn pages in a way that would make FPW redundant. However, I don't see that it provides protection across non-crash write problems. We know we have these since many systems have run without a crash for years and yet still experience corrupt data. Double writes do not require page checksums but neither do they replace page checksums. So I think we need page checksums plus either FPWs or double writes. -- Simon Riggs http://www.2ndQuadrant.com/ PostgreSQL Development, 24x7 Support, Training & Services -- Sent via pgsql-hackers mailing list (pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-hackers
