[csw-users] PostgreSQL and mod_php updates

[Mark Round]

Following on from the recent release of PostgreSQL-8.0.1, I'm pleased
to announce that updated packages are available from Blastwave, and
should be showing up at the mirror sites soon. As there are some big
changes, both in the code and packaging, please make sure you read the
following information before upgrading! I have also updated the PHP
package - read on for more details.

The release notes covering the full list of changes, upgrade notes,
incompatibilities with older versions of PostgreSQL etc. are available
at http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.0/static/release.html#RELEASE-8-0.
It is strongly recommended that you read this document before
upgrading your server.

A brief summary of the changes to the individual packages is attached below :

* postgresql

Apart from the changes made to the code itself (see the above
mentioned link for the release notes), a number of things have changed
with the Blastwave packaging.

CSWpostgresql now installs into /opt/csw/postgresql, instead of
/opt/csw. This is to keep things neat, and also to make the PostgreSQL
packages similar to other "big" CSW packages like gcc3, mysql, apache
etc. You will need to add /opt/csw/postgresql/bin to your $PATH, and
any scripts you have written using the old locations will have to be
changed. Symlinks are provided in /opt/csw/lib for libpq.so.3 and
libecpg.so.4 however, which should still work fine.

If you have upgraded from a previous 7.3.x version of PostgreSQL, your
databases will NOT work on this 8.0.x version. Before upgrading, you
should dump your databases using the old 7.3.x utilities. You can then
create a new data directory using this 8.0.x package, and import your
dumps. This is standard procedure when upgrading between major
versions - see the manual or release notes for more information on
this.

Configuration of the server start-up options is now done through a
user configuration file, /opt/csw/etc/postgresql.conf. A sample
template has been provided for you at
/opt/csw/etc/postgresql.conf.csw. If you want to change any of the
server options, make a copy of this file to
/opt/csw/etc/postgresql.conf and edit it accordingly.

If you cannot modify this file (for instance, you are mounting
/opt/csw from a read-only NFS server), you can use
/etc/opt/csw/postgresql.conf instead, and it will take precedence over
/opt/csw/etc/postgresql.conf.

By default, the cswpostgres init script will start the server up
listening on localhost only. If you want to allow other hosts on your
network to connect, you will need to add "-o -i" to the value of
SERVEROPTS in the user configuration file and restart your server. The
included template has the line already entered, you just need to
uncomment it (remove the leading #).

Once this is done, PostgreSQL will now bind to all network interfaces
and listen for connections. You will still need to configure which
hosts are allowed access by modifying the pg_hba.conf file in your
data directory - read the manual for more information on this.

 
* libpq

No major changes to this package - it's just been updated so that it
also installs into /opt/csw/postgresql.


* libpqxx

This has been updated to version 2.4.3, and has been built with Sun's
C++ compiler.

* libpqxx_gcc

This is a new package, and is a package of libpqxx compiled with gcc
3.4.3 This is so you can use it to develop PostgreSQL-aware C++
programs using the gcc compiler (handy if you don't have Sun's
compilers installed).

* postgresqljdbc

Again, a different installation path : /opt/csw/postgresql/share. Note
that with the 8.0 release JDBC 1 support has been removed, so you will
have to be running a JDK newer than or equal to JDK 1.2.

* mod_php

Has been rebuilt linked against the new PostgreSQL libraries, and also
has MySQLi support added, for full support of MySQL 4.1.x. In
addition, it will now check for the presence of a php.ini file during
installation - if none is found, it will copy php.ini-dist over. Some
warning text will be displayed during package installation notifying
you that this configuration is fine for development systems, but is
not well suited for live situations.

Please let me know of any problems or issues with these new packages
(http://www.blastwave.org/bugtrack/).

Thanks,

-Mark
mark at blastwave.org