                      PostgreSQL Installation Instructions

This document describes the installation of PostgreSQL from the source code
distribution.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Short Version

  ./configure
  gmake
  su
  gmake install
  adduser postgres
  mkdir /usr/local/pgsql/data
  chown postgres /usr/local/pgsql/data
  su - postgres
  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/initdb -D /usr/local/pgsql/data
  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/postmaster -D /usr/local/pgsql/data >logfile 2>&1 &
  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/createdb test
  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/psql test

The long version is the rest of this document.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Requirements

In general, a modern Unix-compatible platform should be able to run PostgreSQL.
The platforms that had received specific testing at the time of release are
listed in the Section called Supported Platforms below. In the "doc"
subdirectory of the distribution there are several platform-specific FAQ
documents you might wish to consult if you are having trouble. The following
software packages are required for building PostgreSQL:

    * GNU make is required; other make programs will *not* work. GNU make is
      often installed under the name "gmake"; this document will always refer
      to it by that name. (On some systems GNU make is the default tool with
      the name "make".) To test for GNU make enter

        gmake --version

      It is recommended to use version 3.76.1 or later.

    * You need an ISO/ANSI C compiler. Recent versions of GCC are
      recommendable, but PostgreSQL is known to build with a wide variety of
      compilers from different vendors.

    * gzip is needed to unpack the distribution in the first place. If you are
      reading this, you probably already got past that hurdle.

    * The GNU Readline library (for comfortable line editing and command
      history retrieval) will be used by default. If you don't want to use it
      then you must specify the "--without-readline" option for "configure".
      (On NetBSD, the "libedit" library is Readline-compatible and is used if
      "libreadline" is not found.)

    * To build on Windows NT or Windows 2000 you need the Cygwin and cygipc
      packages. See the file "doc/FAQ_MSWIN" for details.

The following packages are optional. They are not required in the default
configuration, but they are needed when certain build options are enabled, as
explained below.

    * To build the server programming language PL/Perl you need a full Perl
      installation, including the "libperl" library and the header files. Since
      PL/Perl will be a shared library, the "libperl" library must be a shared
      library also on most platforms. This appears to be the default in recent
      Perl versions, but it was not in earlier versions, and in general it is
      the choice of whomever installed Perl at your site.
      If you don't have the shared library but you need one, a message like
      this will appear during the build to point out this fact:

        *** Cannot build PL/Perl because libperl is not a shared library.
        *** You might have to rebuild your Perl installation.  Refer to
        *** the documentation for details.

      (If you don't follow the on-screen output you will merely notice that the
      PL/Perl library object, "plperl.so" or similar, will not be installed.)
      If you see this, you will have to rebuild and install Perl manually to be
      able to build PL/Perl. During the configuration process for Perl, request
      a shared library.

    * To build the PL/Python server programming language, you need a Python
      installation, including the header files. Since PL/Python will be a
      shared library, the "libpython" library must be a shared library also on
      most platforms. This is not the case in a default Python installation.
      If after building and installing you have a file called "plpython.so"
      (possibly a different extension), then everything went well. Otherwise
      you should have seen a notice like this flying by:

        *** Cannot build PL/Python because libpython is not a shared library.
        *** You might have to rebuild your Python installation.  Refer to
        *** the documentation for details.

      That means you have to rebuild (part of) your Python installation to
      supply this shared library.
      The catch is that the Python distribution or the Python maintainers do
      not provide any direct way to do this. The closest thing we can offer you
      is the information in Python FAQ 3.30. On some operating systems you
      don't really have to build a shared library, but then you will have to
      convince the PostgreSQL build system of this. Consult the "Makefile" in
      the "src/pl/plpython" directory for details.

    * If you want to build Tcl or Tk components (clients and the PL/Tcl
      language) you of course need a Tcl installation.

    * To build the JDBC driver, you need Ant 1.5 or higher and a JDK. Ant is a
      special tool for building Java-based packages. It can be downloaded from
      the Ant web site.
      If you have several Java compilers installed, it depends on the Ant
      configuration which one gets used. Precompiled Ant distributions are
      typically set up to read a file ".antrc" in the current user's home
      directory for configuration. For example, to use a different JDK than the
      default, this may work:

        JAVA_HOME=/usr/local/sun-jdk1.3
        JAVACMD=$JAVA_HOME/bin/java

           Note: Do not try to build the driver by calling "ant" or even
           "javac" directly. This will not work. Run "gmake" normally as
           described below.

    * To enable Native Language Support (NLS), that is, the ability to display
      a program's messages in a language other than English, you need an
      implementation of the Gettext API. Some operating systems have this
      built-in (e.g., Linux, NetBSD, Solaris), for other systems you can
      download an add-on package from here: http://www.postgresql.org/~petere/
      gettext.html. If you are using the Gettext implementation in the GNU C
      library then you will additionally need the GNU Gettext package for some
      utility programs. For any of the other implementations you will not need
      it.

    * Kerberos, OpenSSL, or PAM, if you want to support authentication using
      these services.

If you are building from a CVS tree instead of using a released source package,
or if you want to do development, you also need the following packages:

    * Flex and Bison are needed to build a CVS checkout or if you changed the
      actual scanner and parser definition files. If you need them, be sure to
      get Flex 2.5.4 or later and Bison 1.875 or later. Other yacc programs can
      sometimes be used, but doing so requires extra effort and is not
      recommended. Other lex programs will definitely not work.

If you need to get a GNU package, you can find it at your local GNU mirror site
(see http://www.gnu.org/order/ftp.html for a list) or at ftp://ftp.gnu.org/
gnu/.
Also check that you have sufficient disk space. You will need about 65 MB for
the source tree during compilation and about 15 MB for the installation
directory. An empty database cluster takes about 25 MB, databases take about
five times the amount of space that a flat text file with the same data would
take. If you are going to run the regression tests you will temporarily need up
to an extra 90 MB. Use the "df" command to check for disk space.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If You Are Upgrading

The internal data storage format changes with new releases of PostgreSQL.
Therefore, if you are upgrading an existing installation that does not have a
version number "7.4.x", you must back up and restore your data as shown here.
These instructions assume that your existing installation is under the "/usr/
local/pgsql" directory, and that the data area is in "/usr/local/pgsql/data".
Substitute your paths appropriately.

   1. Make sure that your database is not updated during or after the backup.
      This does not affect the integrity of the backup, but the changed data
      would of course not be included. If necessary, edit the permissions in
      the file "/usr/local/pgsql/data/pg_hba.conf" (or equivalent) to disallow
      access from everyone except you.

   2. To back up your database installation, type:

        pg_dumpall > outputfile

      If you need to preserve OIDs (such as when using them as foreign keys),
      then use the "-o" option when running "pg_dumpall".
      "pg_dumpall" does not save large objects. Check the documentation if you
      need to do this.
      To make the backup, you can use the "pg_dumpall" command from the version
      you are currently running. For best results, however, try to use the
      "pg_dumpall" command from PostgreSQL 7.4, since this version contains
      bug fixes and improvements over older versions. While this advice might
      seem idiosyncratic since you haven't installed the new version yet, it is
      advisable to follow it if you plan to install the new version in parallel
      with the old version. In that case you can complete the installation
      normally and transfer the data later. This will also decrease the
      downtime.

   3. If you are installing the new version at the same location as the old one
      then shut down the old server, at the latest before you install the new
      files:

        kill -INT `cat /usr/local/pgsql/data/postmaster.pid`

      Versions prior to 7.0 do not have this "postmaster.pid" file. If you are
      using such a version you must find out the process ID of the server
      yourself, for example by typing "ps ax | grep postmaster", and supply it
      to the "kill" command.
      On systems that have PostgreSQL started at boot time, there is probably a
      start-up file that will accomplish the same thing. For example, on a Red
      Hat Linux system one might find that

        /etc/rc.d/init.d/postgresql stop

      works. Another possibility is "pg_ctl stop".

   4. If you are installing in the same place as the old version then it is
      also a good idea to move the old installation out of the way, in case you
      have trouble and need to revert to it. Use a command like this:

        mv /usr/local/pgsql /usr/local/pgsql.old

After you have installed PostgreSQL 7.4, create a new database directory and
start the new server. Remember that you must execute these commands while
logged in to the special database user account (which you already have if you
are upgrading).

  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/initdb -D /usr/local/pgsql/data
  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/postmaster -D /usr/local/pgsql/data

Finally, restore your data with

  /usr/local/pgsql/bin/psql -d template1 -f outputfile

using the *new* psql.
These topics are discussed at length in the documentation, which you are
encouraged to read in any case.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Installation Procedure

   1. Configuration
      The first step of the installation procedure is to configure the source
      tree for your system and choose the options you would like. This is done
      by running the "configure" script. For a default installation simply
      enter

        ./configure

      This script will run a number of tests to guess values for various system
      dependent variables and detect some quirks of your operating system, and
      finally will create several files in the build tree to record what it
      found. (You can also run "configure" in a directory outside the source
      tree if you want to keep the build directory separate.)
      The default configuration will build the server and utilities, as well as
      all client applications and interfaces that require only a C compiler.
      All files will be installed under "/usr/local/pgsql" by default.
      You can customize the build and installation process by supplying one or
      more of the following command line options to "configure":

        --prefix=PREFIX

            Install all files under the directory "PREFIX" instead of "/usr/
            local/pgsql". The actual files will be installed into various
            subdirectories; no files will ever be installed directly into the
            "PREFIX" directory.
            If you have special needs, you can also customize the individual
            subdirectories with the following options.

        --exec-prefix=EXEC-PREFIX

            You can install architecture-dependent files under a different
            prefix, "EXEC-PREFIX", than what "PREFIX" was set to. This can be
            useful to share architecture-independent files between hosts. If
            you omit this, then "EXEC-PREFIX" is set equal to "PREFIX" and both
            architecture-dependent and independent files will be installed
            under the same tree, which is probably what you want.

        --bindir=DIRECTORY

            Specifies the directory for executable programs. The default is
            "EXEC-PREFIX/bin", which normally means "/usr/local/pgsql/bin".

        --datadir=DIRECTORY

            Sets the directory for read-only data files used by the installed
            programs. The default is "PREFIX/share". Note that this has nothing
            to do with where your database files will be placed.

        --sysconfdir=DIRECTORY

            The directory for various configuration files, "PREFIX/etc" by
            default.

        --libdir=DIRECTORY

            The location to install libraries and dynamically loadable modules.
            The default is "EXEC-PREFIX/lib".

        --includedir=DIRECTORY

            The directory for installing C and C++ header files. The default is
            "PREFIX/include".

        --docdir=DIRECTORY

            Documentation files, except "man" pages, will be installed into
            this directory. The default is "PREFIX/doc".

        --mandir=DIRECTORY

            The man pages that come with PostgreSQL will be installed under
            this directory, in their respective "manx" subdirectories. The
            default is "PREFIX/man".

           Note: Care has been taken to make it possible to install
           PostgreSQL into shared installation locations (such as "/usr/
           local/include") without interfering with the namespace of the
           rest of the system. First, the string "/postgresql" is
           automatically appended to datadir, sysconfdir, and docdir,
           unless the fully expanded directory name already contains the
           string "postgres" or "pgsql". For example, if you choose "/usr/
           local" as prefix, the documentation will be installed in "/usr/
           local/doc/postgresql", but if the prefix is "/opt/postgres",
           then it will be in "/opt/postgres/doc". The public C header
           files of the client interfaces are installed into includedir
           and are namespace-clean. The internal header files and the
           server header files are installed into private directories
           under includedir. See the documentation of each interface for
           information about how to get at the its header files. Finally,
           a private subdirectory will also be created, if appropriate,
           under libdir for dynamically loadable modules.

        --with-includes=DIRECTORIES

            "DIRECTORIES" is a colon-separated list of directories that will be
            added to the list the compiler searches for header files. If you
            have optional packages (such as GNU Readline) installed in a non-
            standard location, you have to use this option and probably also
            the corresponding "--with-libraries" option.
            Example: --with-includes=/opt/gnu/include:/usr/sup/include.

        --with-libraries=DIRECTORIES

            "DIRECTORIES" is a colon-separated list of directories to search
            for libraries. You will probably have to use this option (and the
            corresponding "--with-includes" option) if you have packages
            installed in non-standard locations.
            Example: --with-libraries=/opt/gnu/lib:/usr/sup/lib.

        --enable-nls[=LANGUAGES]

            Enables Native Language Support (NLS), that is, the ability to
            display a program's messages in a language other than English.
            "LANGUAGES" is a space separated list of codes of the languages
            that you want supported, for example --enable-nls='de fr'. (The
            intersection between your list and the set of actually provided
            translations will be computed automatically.) If you do not specify
            a list, then all available translations are installed.
            To use this option, you will need an implementation of the Gettext
            API; see above.

        --with-pgport=NUMBER

            Set "NUMBER" as the default port number for server and clients. The
            default is 5432. The port can always be changed later on, but if
            you specify it here then both server and clients will have the same
            default compiled in, which can be very convenient. Usually the only
            good reason to select a non-default value is if you intend to run
            multiple PostgreSQL servers on the same machine.

        --with-perl

            Build the PL/Perl server-side language.

        --with-python

            Build the PL/Python server-side language.

        --with-tcl

            Build components that require Tcl/Tk, which are libpgtcl, pgtclsh,
            pgtksh, and PL/Tcl. But see below about "--without-tk".

        --without-tk

            If you specify "--with-tcl" and this option, then the program that
            requires Tk (pgtksh) will be excluded.

        --with-tclconfig=DIRECTORY, --with-tkconfig=DIRECTORY

            Tcl/Tk installs the files "tclConfig.sh" and "tkConfig.sh", which
            contain configuration information needed to build modules
            interfacing to Tcl or Tk. These files are normally found
            automatically at their well-known locations, but if you want to use
            a different version of Tcl or Tk you can specify the directory in
            which to find them.

        --with-java

            Build the JDBC driver and associated Java packages.

        --with-krb4[=DIRECTORY], --with-krb5[=DIRECTORY]

            Build with support for Kerberos authentication. You can use either
            Kerberos version 4 or 5, but not both. The "DIRECTORY" argument
            specifies the root directory of the Kerberos installation; "/usr/
            athena" is assumed as default. If the relevant header files and
            libraries are not under a common parent directory, then you must
            use the "--with-includes" and "--with-libraries" options in
            addition to this option. If, on the other hand, the required files
            are in a location that is searched by default (e.g., "/usr/lib"),
            then you can leave off the argument.
            "configure" will check for the required header files and libraries
            to make sure that your Kerberos installation is sufficient before
            proceeding.

        --with-krb-srvnam=NAME

            The name of the Kerberos service principal. postgres is the
            default. There's probably no reason to change this.

        --with-openssl[=DIRECTORY]

            Build with support for SSL (encrypted) connections. This requires
            the OpenSSL package to be installed. The "DIRECTORY" argument
            specifies the root directory of the OpenSSL installation; the
            default is "/usr/local/ssl".
            "configure" will check for the required header files and libraries
            to make sure that your OpenSSL installation is sufficient before
            proceeding.

        --with-pam

            Build with PAM (Pluggable Authentication Modules) support.

        --without-readline

            Prevents the use of the Readline library. This disables command-
            line editing and history in psql, so it is not recommended.

        --with-rendezvous

            Build with Rendezvous support.

        --disable-spinlocks

            Allow the builds to succeed even if PostgreSQL has no CPU spinlock
            support for the platform. The lack of spinlock support will result
            in poor performance; therefore, this option should only be used if
            the build aborts and informs you that the platform lacks spinlock
            support.

        --enable-thread-safety

            Make the client libraries thread-safe. This allows concurrent
            threads in libpq and ECPG programs to safely control their private
            connection handles.

        --without-zlib

            Prevents the use of the Zlib library. This disables compression
            support in pg_dump. This option is only intended for those rare
            systems where this library is not available.

        --enable-debug

            Compiles all programs and libraries with debugging symbols. This
            means that you can run the programs through a debugger to analyze
            problems. This enlarges the size of the installed executables
            considerably, and on non-GCC compilers it usually also disables
            compiler optimization, causing slowdowns. However, having the
            symbols available is extremely helpful for dealing with any
            problems that may arise. Currently, this option is recommended for
            production installations only if you use GCC. But you should always
            have it on if you are doing development work or running a beta
            version.

        --enable-cassert

            Enables assertion checks in the server, which test for many "can't
            happen" conditions. This is invaluable for code development
            purposes, but the tests slow things down a little. Also, having the
            tests turned on won't necessarily enhance the stability of your
            server! The assertion checks are not categorized for severity, and
            so what might be a relatively harmless bug will still lead to
            server restarts if it triggers an assertion failure. Currently,
            this option is not recommended for production use, but you should
            have it on for development work or when running a beta version.

        --enable-depend

            Enables automatic dependency tracking. With this option, the
            makefiles are set up so that all affected object files will be
            rebuilt when any header file is changed. This is useful if you are
            doing development work, but is just wasted overhead if you intend
            only to compile once and install. At present, this option will work
            only if you use GCC.

      If you prefer a C compiler different from the one "configure" picks then
      you can set the environment variable CC to the program of your choice. By
      default, "configure" will pick "gcc" unless this is inappropriate for the
      platform. Similarly, you can override the default compiler flags with the
      CFLAGS variable.

      You can specify environment variables on the "configure" command line,
      for example:

        ./configure CC=/opt/bin/gcc CFLAGS='-O2 -pipe'

   2. Build
      To start the build, type

        gmake

      (Remember to use GNU make.) The build may take anywhere from 5 minutes to
      half an hour depending on your hardware. The last line displayed should
      be

        All of PostgreSQL is successfully made. Ready to install.

   3. Regression Tests
      If you want to test the newly built server before you install it, you can
      run the regression tests at this point. The regression tests are a test
      suite to verify that PostgreSQL runs on your machine in the way the
      developers expected it to. Type

        gmake check

      (This won't work as root; do it as an unprivileged user.) The file "src/
      test/regress/README" and the documentation contain detailed information
      about interpreting the test results. You can repeat this test at any
      later time by issuing the same command.

   4. Installing The Files
           Note: If you are upgrading an existing system and are going to
           install the new files over the old ones, then you should have
           backed up your data and shut down the old server by now, as
           explained in
           the Section called If You Are Upgrading
            above.
      To install PostgreSQL enter

        gmake install

      This will install files into the directories that were specified in step
      1. Make sure that you have appropriate permissions to write into that
      area. Normally you need to do this step as root. Alternatively, you could
      create the target directories in advance and arrange for appropriate
      permissions to be granted.
      You can use gmake install-strip instead of gmake install to strip the
      executable files and libraries as they are installed. This will save some
      space. If you built with debugging support, stripping will effectively
      remove the debugging support, so it should only be done if debugging is
      no longer needed. install-strip tries to do a reasonable job saving
      space, but it does not have perfect knowledge of how to strip every
      unneeded byte from an executable file, so if you want to save all the
      disk space you possibly can, you will have to do manual work.
      The standard installation provides only the header files needed for
      client application development. If you plan to do any server-side program
      development (such as custom functions or data types written in C), then
      you may want to install the entire PostgreSQL include tree into your
      target include directory. To do that, enter

        gmake install-all-headers

      This adds a megabyte or two to the installation footprint, and is only
      useful if you don't plan to keep the whole source tree around for
      reference. (If you do, you can just use the source's include directory
      when building server-side software.)
      Client-only installation: If you want to install only the client
      applications and interface libraries, then you can use these commands:

        gmake -C src/bin install
        gmake -C src/include install
        gmake -C src/interfaces install
        gmake -C doc install

Uninstallation: To undo the installation use the command "gmake uninstall".
However, this will not remove any created directories.
Cleaning: After the installation you can make room by removing the built files
from the source tree with the command "gmake clean". This will preserve the
files made by the "configure" program, so that you can rebuild everything with
"gmake" later on. To reset the source tree to the state in which it was
distributed, use "gmake distclean". If you are going to build for several
platforms from the same source tree you must do this and re-configure for each
build.
If you perform a build and then discover that your "configure" options were
wrong, or if you change anything that "configure" investigates (for example,
software upgrades), then it's a good idea to do "gmake distclean" before
reconfiguring and rebuilding. Without this, your changes in configuration
choices may not propagate everywhere they need to.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Post-Installation Setup

Shared Libraries

On some systems that have shared libraries (which most systems do) you need to
tell your system how to find the newly installed shared libraries. The systems
on which this is *not* necessary include BSD/OS, FreeBSD, HP-UX, IRIX, Linux,
NetBSD, OpenBSD, Tru64 UNIX (formerly Digital UNIX), and Solaris.
The method to set the shared library search path varies between platforms, but
the most widely usable method is to set the environment variable
LD_LIBRARY_PATH like so: In Bourne shells ("sh", "ksh", "bash", "zsh")

  LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/pgsql/lib
  export LD_LIBRARY_PATH

or in "csh" or "tcsh"

  setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH /usr/local/pgsql/lib

Replace /usr/local/pgsql/lib with whatever you set "--libdir" to in step 1. You
should put these commands into a shell start-up file such as "/etc/profile" or
"~/.bash_profile". Some good information about the caveats associated with this
method can be found at http://www.visi.com/~barr/ldpath.html.
On some systems it might be preferable to set the environment variable
LD_RUN_PATH *before* building.
On Cygwin, put the library directory in the PATH or move the ".dll" files into
the "bin" directory.
If in doubt, refer to the manual pages of your system (perhaps "ld.so" or
"rld"). If you later on get a message like

  psql: error in loading shared libraries
  libpq.so.2.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

then this step was necessary. Simply take care of it then.
If you are on BSD/OS, Linux, or SunOS 4 and you have root access you can run

  /sbin/ldconfig /usr/local/pgsql/lib

(or equivalent directory) after installation to enable the run-time linker to
find the shared libraries faster. Refer to the manual page of "ldconfig" for
more information. On FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD the command is

  /sbin/ldconfig -m /usr/local/pgsql/lib

instead. Other systems are not known to have an equivalent command.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Environment Variables

If you installed into "/usr/local/pgsql" or some other location that is not
searched for programs by default, you should add "/usr/local/pgsql/bin" (or
whatever you set "--bindir" to in step 1) into your PATH. Strictly speaking,
this is not necessary, but it will make the use of PostgreSQL much more
convenient.
To do this, add the following to your shell start-up file, such as
"~/.bash_profile" (or "/etc/profile", if you want it to affect every user):

  PATH=/usr/local/pgsql/bin:$PATH
  export PATH

If you are using "csh" or "tcsh", then use this command:

  set path = ( /usr/local/pgsql/bin $path )

To enable your system to find the man documentation, you need to add lines like
the following to a shell start-up file unless you installed into a location
that is searched by default.

  MANPATH=/usr/local/pgsql/man:$MANPATH
  export MANPATH

The environment variables PGHOST and PGPORT specify to client applications the
host and port of the database server, overriding the compiled-in defaults. If
you are going to run client applications remotely then it is convenient if
every user that plans to use the database sets PGHOST. This is not required,
however: the settings can be communicated via command line options to most
client programs.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Getting Started

The following is a quick summary of how to get PostgreSQL up and running once
installed. The main documentation contains more information.

   1. Create a user account for the PostgreSQL server. This is the user the
      server will run as. For production use you should create a separate,
      unprivileged account ("postgres" is commonly used). If you do not have
      root access or just want to play around, your own user account is enough,
      but running the server as root is a security risk and will not work.

        adduser postgres

   2. Create a database installation with the "initdb" command. To run "initdb"
      you must be logged in to your PostgreSQL server account. It will not work
      as root.

        root# mkdir /usr/local/pgsql/data
        root# chown postgres /usr/local/pgsql/data
        root# su - postgres
        postgres$ /usr/local/pgsql/bin/initdb -D /usr/local/pgsql/data

      The "-D" option specifies the location where the data will be stored. You
      can use any path you want, it does not have to be under the installation
      directory. Just make sure that the server account can write to the
      directory (or create it, if it doesn't already exist) before starting
      "initdb", as illustrated here.

   3. The previous step should have told you how to start up the database
      server. Do so now. The command should look something like

        /usr/local/pgsql/bin/postmaster -D /usr/local/pgsql/data

      This will start the server in the foreground. To put the server in the
      background use something like

        nohup /usr/local/pgsql/bin/postmaster -D /usr/local/pgsql/data \
            </dev/null >>server.log 2>&1 </dev/null &

      To stop a server running in the background you can type

        kill `cat /usr/local/pgsql/data/postmaster.pid`

      In order to allow TCP/IP connections (rather than only Unix domain socket
      ones) you need to pass the "-i" option to "postmaster".

   4. Create a database:

        createdb testdb

      Then enter

        psql testdb

      to connect to that database. At the prompt you can enter SQL commands and
      start experimenting.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What Now?

    * The PostgreSQL distribution contains a comprehensive documentation set,
      which you should read sometime. After installation, the documentation can
      be accessed by pointing your browser to "/usr/local/pgsql/doc/html/
      index.html", unless you changed the installation directories.
      The first few chapters of the main documentation are the Tutorial, which
      should be your first reading if you are completely new to SQL databases.
      If you are familiar with database concepts then you want to proceed with
      part on server administration, which contains information about how to
      set up the database server, database users, and authentication.

    * Usually, you will want to modify your computer so that it will
      automatically start the database server whenever it boots. Some
      suggestions for this are in the documentation.

    * Run the regression tests against the installed server (using "gmake
      installcheck"). If you didn't run the tests before installation, you
      should definitely do it now. This is also explained in the documentation.

    * By default, PostgreSQL is configured to run on minimal hardware. This
      allows it to start up with almost any hardware configuration. The default
      configuration is, however, not designed for optimum performance. To
      achieve optimum performance, several server parameters must be adjusted,
      the two most common being shared_buffers and sort_mem mentioned in the
      documentation. Other parameters mentioned in the documentation also
      affect performance.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Supported Platforms

PostgreSQL has been verified by the developer community to work on the
platforms listed below. A supported platform generally means that PostgreSQL
builds and installs according to these instructions and that the regression
tests pass.
     Note: If you are having problems with the installation on a supported
     platform, please write to <pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org> or <pgsql-
     ports@postgresql.org>, not to the people listed here.
 _____________________________________________________________________________
|OS__________|Processor|Version|Reported______________________|Remarks________|
|AIX         |RS6000   |7.4    |2003-10-25, Hans-Jürgen       |see also doc/  |
|____________|_________|_______|Schönig_(<hs@cybertec.at>)____|FAQ_AIX________|
|BSD/OS      |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-24, Bruce Momjian     |4.3            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<pgman@candle.pha.pa.us>)____|_______________|
|FreeBSD     |Alpha    |7.4    |2003-10-25, Peter Eisentraut  |4.8            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|FreeBSD     |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-24, Peter Eisentraut  |4.9            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|HP-UX       |PA-RISC  |7.4    |2003-10-31, 10.20, Tom Lane   |gcc and cc; see|
|            |         |       |(<tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>); 2003-  |also doc/      |
|            |         |       |11-04, 11.00, Peter Eisentraut|FAQ_HPUX       |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|IRIX        |MIPS     |7.4    |2003-11-12, Robert E.         |6.5.20, cc only|
|            |         |       |Bruccoleri                    |               |
|____________|_________|_______|(<bruc@stone.congenomics.com>)|_______________|
|Linux       |Alpha    |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |arm41    |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |Itanium  |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |m68k     |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |MIPS     |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |Opteron  |7.4    |2003-11-01, Jani Averbach     |2.6            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<jaa@cc.jyu.fi>)_____________|_______________|
|Linux       |PPC      |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |               |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |S/390    |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe        |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<noel@debian.org>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |Sparc    |7.4    |2003-10-24, Peter Eisentraut  |2.4, 32-bit    |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|Linux       |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-24, Peter Eisentraut  |2.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|MacOS X     |PPC      |7.4    |2003-10-24, 10.2.8, Adam      |               |
|            |         |       |Witney                        |               |
|            |         |       |(<awitney@sghms.ac.uk>), 10.3,|               |
|            |         |       |Marko Karppinen               |               |
|____________|_________|_______|(<marko@karppinen.fi>)________|_______________|
|NetBSD      |arm32    |7.4    |2003-11-12, Patrick Welche    |1.6ZE/acorn32  |
|____________|_________|_______|(<prlw1@newn.cam.ac.uk>)______|_______________|
|NetBSD      |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-24, Peter Eisentraut  |1.6            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|OpenBSD     |Sparc    |7.4    |2003-11-01, Peter Eisentraut  |3.4            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|OpenBSD     |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-24, Peter Eisentraut  |3.2            |
|____________|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|_______________|
|Solaris     |Sparc    |7.4    |2003-10-26, Christopher Browne|2.8; see also  |
|____________|_________|_______|(<cbbrowne@libertyrms.info>)__|doc/FAQ_Solaris|
|Solaris     |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-26, Kurt Roeckx       |2.6 see also   |
|____________|_________|_______|(<Q@ping.be>)_________________|doc/FAQ_Solaris|
|Tru64 UNIX  |Alpha    |7.4    |2003-10-25, 5.1b, Peter       |               |
|            |         |       |Eisentraut                    |               |
|            |         |       |(<peter_e@gmx.net>); 2003-10- |               |
|            |         |       |29, 4.0g, Alessio Bragadini   |               |
|____________|_________|_______|(<alessio@albourne.com>)______|_______________|
|UnixWare    |x86      |7.4    |2003-11-03, Larry Rosenman    |7.1.3; join    |
|            |         |       |(<ler@lerctr.org>)            |test may fail, |
|            |         |       |                              |see also doc/  |
|____________|_________|_______|______________________________|FAQ_SCO________|
|Windows with|x86      |7.4    |2003-10-24, Peter Eisentraut  |see doc/       |
|Cygwin______|_________|_______|(<peter_e@gmx.net>)___________|FAQ_MSWIN______|
|Windows     |x86      |7.4    |2003-10-27, Dave Page         |native is      |
|            |         |       |(<dpage@vale-housing.co.uk>)  |client-side    |
|            |         |       |                              |only, see      |
|____________|_________|_______|______________________________|documentation__|

Unsupported Platforms: The following platforms are either known not to work, or
they used to work in a previous release and we did not receive explicit
confirmation of a successful test with version 7.4 at the time this list was
compiled. We include these here to let you know that these platforms *could* be
supported if given some attention.
 ________________________________________________________________________________
|OS________|Processor__|Version|Reported_______________________|Remarks__________|
|BeOS      |x86        |7.2    |2001-11-29, Cyril Velter       |needs updates to |
|__________|___________|_______|(<cyril.velter@libertysurf.fr>)|semaphore_code___|
|Linux     |PlayStation|7.4    |2003-11-02, Peter Eisentraut   |needs new        |
|          |2          |       |(<peter_e@gmx.net>)            |config.guess, -- |
|          |           |       |                               |disable-         |
|          |           |       |                               |spinlocks, #undef|
|          |           |       |                               |HAS_TEST_AND_SET,|
|          |           |       |                               |disable tas_dummy|
|__________|___________|_______|_______________________________|()_______________|
|Linux     |PA-RISC    |7.4    |2003-10-25, Noèl Köthe         |needs --disable- |
|          |           |       |(<noel@debian.org>)            |spinlocks,       |
|__________|___________|_______|_______________________________|otherwise_OK_____|
|NetBSD    |Alpha      |7.2    |2001-11-20, Thomas Thai        |1.5W             |
|__________|___________|_______|(<tom@minnesota.com>)__________|_________________|
|NetBSD    |MIPS       |7.2.1  |2002-06-13, Warwick Hunter     |1.5.3            |
|__________|___________|_______|(<whunter@agile.tv>)___________|_________________|
|NetBSD    |PPC        |7.2    |2001-11-28, Bill Studenmund    |1.5              |
|__________|___________|_______|(<wrstuden@netbsd.org>)________|_________________|
|NetBSD    |Sparc      |7.2    |2001-12-03, Matthew Green      |32- and 64-bit   |
|__________|___________|_______|(<mrg@eterna.com.au>)__________|builds___________|
|NetBSD    |VAX        |7.1    |2001-03-30, Tom I. Helbekkmo   |1.5              |
|__________|___________|_______|(<tih@kpnQwest.no>)____________|_________________|
|QNX 4 RTOS|x86        |7.2    |2001-12-10, Bernd Tegge        |needs updates to |
|          |           |       |(<tegge@repas-aeg.de>)         |semaphore code;  |
|          |           |       |                               |see also doc/    |
|__________|___________|_______|_______________________________|FAQ_QNX4_________|
|QNX RTOS  |x86        |7.2    |2001-11-20, Igor Kovalenko     |patches available|
|v6        |           |       |(<Igor.Kovalenko@motorola.com>)|in archives, but |
|__________|___________|_______|_______________________________|too_late_for_7.2_|
|SCO       |x86        |7.3.1  |2002-12-11, Shibashish Satpathy|5.0.4, gcc; see  |
|OpenServer|___________|_______|(<shib@postmark.net>)__________|also_doc/FAQ_SCO_|
|SunOS 4   |Sparc      |7.2    |2001-12-04, Tatsuo Ishii (<t-  |                 |
|__________|___________|_______|ishii@sra.co.jp>)______________|_________________|
