hello,
Now that I have figured out how to send an attachment with crontab, I am attempting to add the backup procedure to the cronjob.

su postgres
pg_dumpall > test



and the error I keep getting is:
postgres does not know where to find the database system data. You must specify the directory that contains the database system either by specifying the -D invocation option or by setting the PGDATA environment variable.

HELP!!

Thanks

hello squadja:

Do a:

find / -name data

This may print several results. Look specifically for either:

/var/lib/pgsql/data

-or-

/usr/local/pgsql/data

Hopefully you will only see one or the other. If you see both, there is a different issue to contend with. Whichever you see, that is the path to your postgresql data directory. Mine happens to be the /var/lib/pgsql/data so when I invoke the command you refer to above I would say:

pg_dumpall -D /var/lib/pgsql/data > test

Postgresql must know this path to do nearly any pg command so it would be helpful to set up the variable it looks for by default, which is PGDATA. To do this go to your:

/etc/profile

file and add this to the file:

PGDATA = /var/lib/pgsql/data
export PGDATA

assuming your search for the data directory produces the same path as mine. Good luck.

That error message was not a big enough clue?

...kind of a harsh retort. One of the reasons people hate Linux (yes, its true, lots of people hate Linux!) is because they get bashed in the head for asking questions. If the learning curve doesnt get them, they get sick of getting piled on every time they open their pie hole. I ahve put in my time reading thousands on pages of docs, books, mans, etc. but I still hate getting blasted for asking a "stupid" question. Give newbies slack. Isn't the whole point of this entire website to ask questions?