Setting up PostgreSQL on Debian

From time to time I need to set up PostgreSQL on a Debian machine. It's fairly straightforward, but I frequently need to look something up, so this time I am writing down my notes.

Debian packages PostgreSQL, and if you don't care about what version of PostgreSQL you use that's the easiest way. If you do care about what version, the PostgreSQL project packages all the supported versions of PostgreSQL - this allows you to install old (supported) versions, and will allow you to easily install PostgreSQL 10 once it is released. The PostgreSQL Debian page includes instructions on how to add their apt repository.

Whether you're installing the Debian-packaged or PostgreSQL-packaged server, installation of the current version of the server is the same:

$ sudo apt install postgresql-9.6

This will install the server and the client, and create and start a cluster.

The default, installer-created cluster does not have data checksums enabled. Data checksums trade performance for safety; since I am not using PostgreSQL in a particularly performance-sensitive environment, I would prefer safety. To enable data checksums, we will need to recreate the cluster.

Additionally, I prefer to have PostgreSQL store its data files in /srv/postgresql instead of /var/lib/postgresql/. Since we're recreating the cluster anyway, we don't need to move any files, and can instead simply specify the new location at creation time.

First, drop the old cluster:

$ sudo -u postgres pg_dropcluster --stop 9.6 main

Then, create the new cluster:

$ sudo -u postgres pg_createcluster \
    --datadir=/srv/postgresql/9.6/main \
    --start \
    9.6 \
    main \
    -- \
    --data-checksums

Note the version and cluster name in the data directory argument. Debian contributors have created wrapper scripts (like pg_createcluster) to allow multiple versions and multiple instances of PostgreSQL to run on the same system side-by-side; including the version and cluster name in the path support that.

You can check that data checksums are enabled by running this query in a psql session:

$ sudo -u postgres psql
postgres=# show data_checksums;
 data_checksums
----------------
 on
(1 row)

Once you've created a cluster, you'll probably want a user and a database:

$ sudo -u postgres createuser ${USER}
$ sudo -u postgres createdb --owner=${USER} ${USER}

Now you should be able to log in with psql!

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