Backup and Restore
- Table of Contents
- 24.1. SQL Dump
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- 24.1.1. Restoring the Dump
- 24.1.2. Using pg_dumpall
- 24.1.3. Handling Large Databases
- 24.2. File System Level Backup
- 24.3. Continuous Archiving and Point-in-Time Recovery (PITR)
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- 24.3.1. Setting Up WAL Archiving
- 24.3.2. Making a Base Backup
- 24.3.3. Making a Base Backup Using the Low Level API
- 24.3.4. Recovering Using a Continuous Archive Backup
- 24.3.5. Timelines
- 24.3.6. Tips and Examples
- 24.3.7. Caveats
As with everything that contains valuable data, PostgreSQL databases should be backed up regularly. While the procedure is essentially simple, it is important to have a clear understanding of the underlying techniques and assumptions.
There are three fundamentally different approaches to backing up PostgreSQL data:
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SQL dump
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File system level backup
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Continuous archiving
Each has its own strengths and weaknesses; each is discussed in turn in the following sections.