Initdb on Windows 2003

Started by Nonamealmost 20 years ago12 messages

James_Hughes@McAfee.com

almost 20 years ago

Hello all,

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much
appreciated.

All the best,
James Hughes

--- EMAIL THREAD FOLLOWS ---

James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi Bruce,

We are now seeing this issue on three machines, all of which are
running Windows 2003. After some looking at the code and putting some
extra debug output (very little) all we have determined is that
initdb.exe opens postgres.exe via pipes, and at some point within
postgres.exe this error is generated.

If we knock out the check for the user being not being admin and run
initdb.exe as an administrator all works as expected. Adding the user
to the 'Power Users' group also causes the "Access Denined" error! I
don't believe that the access denined is anything to do with file
access or memory (shared) access as I ran some tools to see what
postgres.exe is trying to access.

Is there an easy way on Windows to step-through the PostgreSQL code as

it runs? Is there any other information I can provide which will help
you with this defect?

Any help getting to the root of this problem is much appericated.

All the best
James Hughes

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
Sent: 24 February 2006 18:54
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [BUGS] BUG #2268: initdb fails to initialize database
cluster with error "Access is denied"

Strange. It isn't a typical error we see, and the fact you see it on
two machines is even stranger. My guess is that somehow the
configuration on those two machines is the same and is causing the
failure.

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

James Hughes wrote:

The following bug has been logged online:

Bug reference: 2268
Logged by: James Hughes
Email address: james_hughes@mcafee.com
PostgreSQL version: 8.1.3
Operating system: Windows 2003 (Server)
Description: initdb fails to initialize database cluster with

error

"Access is denied"
Details:

When we try and initialize a database cluster using initdb.exe we
are getting the following output.

-- OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --
The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user

"user1".

This user must also own the server process.

The database cluster will be initialized with locale English_United
Kingdom.1252.

creating directory c:/dataa ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/global ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog/archive_status ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_clog ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/pg_subtrans ...
ok

creating directory c:/dataa/pg_twophase ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/members ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/offsets ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/base ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/pg_tblspc ... ok selecting default
max_connections ... Access

is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
10
selecting default shared_buffers ... Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
50
creating configuration files ... ok
creating template1 database in c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok initializing
pg_authid ... Access is denied.
child process was terminated by signal 1
initdb: removing data directory "c:/dataa"

-- end: OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --

user1 is a user without administrative rights. I have checked all
the directories and the user has permissons to write to the data
directory, and read other files it requires.

I also tried the Windows installer (MSI) from pgFoundry. This too is

having the same problem.

We have two machines which this problem occurs on, one of which
originally the initialization would work on. I have checked all the
user rights asssignments, and even given the postgres user (user1 in

the above output from dbinit.exe) all user rights.

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 2: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

James Hughes

Andrew Dunstan

andrew@dunslane.net

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Noname (#1)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

1. please show the EXACT initdb command line used.

2. Which Windows user was actually running initdb?

cheers

andrew

Show quoted text

Hello all,

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much
appreciated.

All the best,
James Hughes
--- EMAIL THREAD FOLLOWS ---
James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi Bruce,

We are now seeing this issue on three machines, all of which are
running Windows 2003. After some looking at the code and putting some
extra debug output (very little) all we have determined is that
initdb.exe opens postgres.exe via pipes, and at some point within
postgres.exe this error is generated.

If we knock out the check for the user being not being admin and run
initdb.exe as an administrator all works as expected. Adding the user
to the 'Power Users' group also causes the "Access Denined" error! I
don't believe that the access denined is anything to do with file
access or memory (shared) access as I ran some tools to see what
postgres.exe is trying to access.

Is there an easy way on Windows to step-through the PostgreSQL code as

it runs? Is there any other information I can provide which will help
you with this defect?

Any help getting to the root of this problem is much appericated.

All the best
James Hughes

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
Sent: 24 February 2006 18:54
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [BUGS] BUG #2268: initdb fails to initialize database
cluster with error "Access is denied"

Strange. It isn't a typical error we see, and the fact you see it on
two machines is even stranger. My guess is that somehow the
configuration on those two machines is the same and is causing the
failure.

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

James Hughes wrote:

The following bug has been logged online:

Bug reference: 2268
Logged by: James Hughes
Email address: james_hughes@mcafee.com
PostgreSQL version: 8.1.3
Operating system: Windows 2003 (Server)
Description: initdb fails to initialize database cluster with

error

"Access is denied"
Details:

When we try and initialize a database cluster using initdb.exe we
are getting the following output.

-- OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --
The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user

"user1".

This user must also own the server process.

The database cluster will be initialized with locale English_United
Kingdom.1252.

creating directory c:/dataa ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/global ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog/archive_status ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_clog ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/pg_subtrans ...
ok

creating directory c:/dataa/pg_twophase ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/members ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/offsets ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/base ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/pg_tblspc ... ok selecting default
max_connections ... Access

is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
10
selecting default shared_buffers ... Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
50
creating configuration files ... ok
creating template1 database in c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok initializing
pg_authid ... Access is denied.
child process was terminated by signal 1
initdb: removing data directory "c:/dataa"

-- end: OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --

user1 is a user without administrative rights. I have checked all
the directories and the user has permissons to write to the data
directory, and read other files it requires.

I also tried the Windows installer (MSI) from pgFoundry. This too is

having the same problem.

We have two machines which this problem occurs on, one of which
originally the initialization would work on. I have checked all the
user rights asssignments, and even given the postgres user (user1 in

the above output from dbinit.exe) all user rights.

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 2: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

James Hughes

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 6: explain analyze is your
friend

Noname

James_Hughes@McAfee.com

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Andrew Dunstan (#2)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

Hi,

1. The command line passed is -D "c:\data" --user=McAfeePostgresUser
2. McAfeePostgresUser which is a local machine user with limited
privileges. Though this problem occurs with any user account you create
with non-administrator privileges.

Thanks
James

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 01 March 2006 13:27
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

1. please show the EXACT initdb command line used.

2. Which Windows user was actually running initdb?

cheers

andrew

Hello all,

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much

appreciated.

All the best,
James Hughes
--- EMAIL THREAD FOLLOWS ---
James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi Bruce,

We are now seeing this issue on three machines, all of which are
running Windows 2003. After some looking at the code and putting some

extra debug output (very little) all we have determined is that
initdb.exe opens postgres.exe via pipes, and at some point within
postgres.exe this error is generated.

If we knock out the check for the user being not being admin and run
initdb.exe as an administrator all works as expected. Adding the user

to the 'Power Users' group also causes the "Access Denined" error! I
don't believe that the access denined is anything to do with file
access or memory (shared) access as I ran some tools to see what
postgres.exe is trying to access.

Is there an easy way on Windows to step-through the PostgreSQL code
as

it runs? Is there any other information I can provide which will help

you with this defect?

Any help getting to the root of this problem is much appericated.

All the best
James Hughes

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
Sent: 24 February 2006 18:54
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [BUGS] BUG #2268: initdb fails to initialize database
cluster with error "Access is denied"

Strange. It isn't a typical error we see, and the fact you see it on

two machines is even stranger. My guess is that somehow the
configuration on those two machines is the same and is causing the
failure.

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

James Hughes wrote:

The following bug has been logged online:

Bug reference: 2268
Logged by: James Hughes
Email address: james_hughes@mcafee.com
PostgreSQL version: 8.1.3
Operating system: Windows 2003 (Server)
Description: initdb fails to initialize database cluster

with

Show quoted text

error

"Access is denied"
Details:

When we try and initialize a database cluster using initdb.exe we
are getting the following output.

-- OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --
The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user

"user1".

This user must also own the server process.

The database cluster will be initialized with locale English_United

Kingdom.1252.

creating directory c:/dataa ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/global ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog/archive_status ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_clog ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/pg_subtrans ...
ok

creating directory c:/dataa/pg_twophase ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/members ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/offsets ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/base ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/pg_tblspc ... ok selecting default
max_connections ... Access

is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
10
selecting default shared_buffers ... Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
50
creating configuration files ... ok creating template1 database in
c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok initializing pg_authid ... Access is denied.
child process was terminated by signal 1
initdb: removing data directory "c:/dataa"

-- end: OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --

user1 is a user without administrative rights. I have checked all
the directories and the user has permissons to write to the data
directory, and read other files it requires.

I also tried the Windows installer (MSI) from pgFoundry. This too
is

having the same problem.

We have two machines which this problem occurs on, one of which
originally the initialization would work on. I have checked all the

user rights asssignments, and even given the postgres user (user1
in

the above output from dbinit.exe) all user rights.

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 2: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

James Hughes

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 6: explain analyze is your
friend

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback

Tom Lane

tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Noname (#1)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

<James_Hughes@McAfee.com> writes:

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much
appreciated.

"Access is denied." is not a string that appears anywhere in the
Postgres source code. My bet is some overenthusiastic anti-virus
code is interfering with the install.

regards, tom lane

Andrew Dunstan

andrew@dunslane.net

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Noname (#3)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

(private email says leaving off --user=foo doesn't fix it ;-( )

Since you have apparently compiled your own, could you please try with
the latest stable initdb.c code for your release? That is version
1.99.2.2 for release 8.1 or 1.73.4.3 for release 8.0. They are
downloadable here:
http://developer.postgresql.org/cvsweb.cgi/pgsql/src/bin/initdb/initdb.c

Maybe there's something odd about your setup - we have a WS2k3 machine
happily building and running on buildfarm: see
http://www.pgbuildfarm.org/cgi-bin/show_history.pl?nm=snake&br=REL8_1_STABLE

If it still doesn't work, you might get some useful info from initdb --debug

Thanks

andrew

James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Show quoted text

Hi,

1. The command line passed is -D "c:\data" --user=McAfeePostgresUser
2. McAfeePostgresUser which is a local machine user with limited
privileges. Though this problem occurs with any user account you create
with non-administrator privileges.

Thanks
James

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 01 March 2006 13:27
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

1. please show the EXACT initdb command line used.

2. Which Windows user was actually running initdb?

cheers

andrew

Hello all,

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much
appreciated.

All the best,
James Hughes
--- EMAIL THREAD FOLLOWS ---
James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi Bruce,

We are now seeing this issue on three machines, all of which are
running Windows 2003. After some looking at the code and putting some
extra debug output (very little) all we have determined is that
initdb.exe opens postgres.exe via pipes, and at some point within
postgres.exe this error is generated.

If we knock out the check for the user being not being admin and run
initdb.exe as an administrator all works as expected. Adding the user

to the 'Power Users' group also causes the "Access Denined" error! I
don't believe that the access denined is anything to do with file
access or memory (shared) access as I ran some tools to see what
postgres.exe is trying to access.

Is there an easy way on Windows to step-through the PostgreSQL code
as

it runs? Is there any other information I can provide which will help

you with this defect?

Any help getting to the root of this problem is much appericated.

All the best
James Hughes

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
Sent: 24 February 2006 18:54
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [BUGS] BUG #2268: initdb fails to initialize database
cluster with error "Access is denied"

Strange. It isn't a typical error we see, and the fact you see it on

two machines is even stranger. My guess is that somehow the
configuration on those two machines is the same and is causing the
failure.

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

James Hughes wrote:

The following bug has been logged online:

Bug reference: 2268
Logged by: James Hughes
Email address: james_hughes@mcafee.com
PostgreSQL version: 8.1.3
Operating system: Windows 2003 (Server)
Description: initdb fails to initialize database cluster

with

error

"Access is denied"
Details:

When we try and initialize a database cluster using initdb.exe we
are getting the following output.

-- OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --
The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user

"user1".

This user must also own the server process.

The database cluster will be initialized with locale English_United

Kingdom.1252.

creating directory c:/dataa ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/global ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog/archive_status ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_clog ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/pg_subtrans ...
ok

creating directory c:/dataa/pg_twophase ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/members ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/offsets ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/base ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/pg_tblspc ... ok selecting default
max_connections ... Access

is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
10
selecting default shared_buffers ... Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
50
creating configuration files ... ok creating template1 database in
c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok initializing pg_authid ... Access is denied.
child process was terminated by signal 1
initdb: removing data directory "c:/dataa"

-- end: OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --

user1 is a user without administrative rights. I have checked all
the directories and the user has permissons to write to the data
directory, and read other files it requires.

I also tried the Windows installer (MSI) from pgFoundry. This too
is

having the same problem.

We have two machines which this problem occurs on, one of which
originally the initialization would work on. I have checked all the

user rights asssignments, and even given the postgres user (user1
in

the above output from dbinit.exe) all user rights.

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 2: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

James Hughes

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 6: explain analyze is your
friend

Noname

James_Hughes@McAfee.com

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Andrew Dunstan (#5)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

Thanks for the info, I shall indeed try this.

One thing to mention is that I don't think the error occurs within
initdb, it seams to be postgres.exe that dbinit starts.

Regards
James

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 01 March 2006 16:26
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

(private email says leaving off --user=foo doesn't fix it ;-( )

Maybe there's something odd about your setup - we have a WS2k3 machine
happily building and running on buildfarm: see
http://www.pgbuildfarm.org/cgi-bin/show_history.pl?nm=snake&br=REL8_1_ST
ABLE

If it still doesn't work, you might get some useful info from initdb
--debug

Thanks

andrew

James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Show quoted text

Hi,

1. The command line passed is -D "c:\data" --user=McAfeePostgresUser 2.

McAfeePostgresUser which is a local machine user with limited
privileges. Though this problem occurs with any user account you create

with non-administrator privileges.

Thanks
James

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 01 March 2006 13:27
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

1. please show the EXACT initdb command line used.

2. Which Windows user was actually running initdb?

cheers

andrew

Hello all,

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much
appreciated.

All the best,
James Hughes
--- EMAIL THREAD FOLLOWS ---
James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi Bruce,

We are now seeing this issue on three machines, all of which are
running Windows 2003. After some looking at the code and putting some
extra debug output (very little) all we have determined is that
initdb.exe opens postgres.exe via pipes, and at some point within
postgres.exe this error is generated.

If we knock out the check for the user being not being admin and run
initdb.exe as an administrator all works as expected. Adding the user

to the 'Power Users' group also causes the "Access Denined" error! I
don't believe that the access denined is anything to do with file
access or memory (shared) access as I ran some tools to see what
postgres.exe is trying to access.

Is there an easy way on Windows to step-through the PostgreSQL code
as

it runs? Is there any other information I can provide which will help

you with this defect?

Any help getting to the root of this problem is much appericated.

All the best
James Hughes

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
Sent: 24 February 2006 18:54
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [BUGS] BUG #2268: initdb fails to initialize database
cluster with error "Access is denied"

Strange. It isn't a typical error we see, and the fact you see it on

two machines is even stranger. My guess is that somehow the
configuration on those two machines is the same and is causing the
failure.

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

James Hughes wrote:

The following bug has been logged online:

Bug reference: 2268
Logged by: James Hughes
Email address: james_hughes@mcafee.com
PostgreSQL version: 8.1.3
Operating system: Windows 2003 (Server)
Description: initdb fails to initialize database cluster

with

error

"Access is denied"
Details:

When we try and initialize a database cluster using initdb.exe we
are getting the following output.

-- OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --
The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user

"user1".

This user must also own the server process.

The database cluster will be initialized with locale English_United

Kingdom.1252.

creating directory c:/dataa ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/global ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog/archive_status ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_clog ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/pg_subtrans ...
ok

creating directory c:/dataa/pg_twophase ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/members ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/offsets ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/base ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/pg_tblspc ... ok selecting default
max_connections ... Access

is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
10
selecting default shared_buffers ... Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
50
creating configuration files ... ok creating template1 database in
c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok initializing pg_authid ... Access is denied.
child process was terminated by signal 1
initdb: removing data directory "c:/dataa"

-- end: OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --

user1 is a user without administrative rights. I have checked all
the directories and the user has permissons to write to the data
directory, and read other files it requires.

I also tried the Windows installer (MSI) from pgFoundry. This too is

having the same problem.

We have two machines which this problem occurs on, one of which
originally the initialization would work on. I have checked all the

user rights asssignments, and even given the postgres user (user1
in

the above output from dbinit.exe) all user rights.

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 2: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

James Hughes

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 6: explain analyze is your
friend

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback

Noname

James_Hughes@McAfee.com

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Noname (#6)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

All

I have determined what is causing the failure. It appears that the
stdout & stderr redirection to nul produces the "Access is Denied."
message. This is happening even if I type "dir >nul" at the command
prompt! I assume that this re-direction in PostgreSQL is done when
starting postgres.exe as to allow the communction between the two
processes?

I know this is not the correct place to ask my next question but maybe
there is a Windows expert out there :o) Does anyone have any idea how
Windows controls access to devices such as nul,comN, lpt1, etc? Or what
security setting governs this?

Thanks all for your help.

Regards
James

-----Original Message-----
From: pgsql-hackers-owner@postgresql.org
[mailto:pgsql-hackers-owner@postgresql.org] On Behalf Of Hughes, James
Sent: 02 March 2006 07:51
To: andrew@dunslane.net
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

Thanks for the info, I shall indeed try this.

One thing to mention is that I don't think the error occurs within
initdb, it seams to be postgres.exe that dbinit starts.

Regards
James

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 01 March 2006 16:26
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

(private email says leaving off --user=foo doesn't fix it ;-( )

Maybe there's something odd about your setup - we have a WS2k3 machine
happily building and running on buildfarm: see
http://www.pgbuildfarm.org/cgi-bin/show_history.pl?nm=snake&br=REL8_1_ST
ABLE

If it still doesn't work, you might get some useful info from initdb
--debug

Thanks

andrew

James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi,

1. The command line passed is -D "c:\data" --user=McAfeePostgresUser 2.

McAfeePostgresUser which is a local machine user with limited
privileges. Though this problem occurs with any user account you create

with non-administrator privileges.

Thanks
James

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 01 March 2006 13:27
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

1. please show the EXACT initdb command line used.

2. Which Windows user was actually running initdb?

cheers

andrew

Hello all,

Below is an email thread regarding a possible bug in PostgreSQL on
Windows 2003. Any help or advice anyone can give on this would be much
appreciated.

All the best,
James Hughes
--- EMAIL THREAD FOLLOWS ---
James_Hughes@McAfee.com wrote:

Hi Bruce,

We are now seeing this issue on three machines, all of which are
running Windows 2003. After some looking at the code and putting some
extra debug output (very little) all we have determined is that
initdb.exe opens postgres.exe via pipes, and at some point within
postgres.exe this error is generated.

If we knock out the check for the user being not being admin and run
initdb.exe as an administrator all works as expected. Adding the user

to the 'Power Users' group also causes the "Access Denined" error! I
don't believe that the access denined is anything to do with file
access or memory (shared) access as I ran some tools to see what
postgres.exe is trying to access.

Is there an easy way on Windows to step-through the PostgreSQL code
as

it runs? Is there any other information I can provide which will help

you with this defect?

Any help getting to the root of this problem is much appericated.

All the best
James Hughes

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Momjian [mailto:pgman@candle.pha.pa.us]
Sent: 24 February 2006 18:54
To: Hughes, James
Cc: pgsql-bugs@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [BUGS] BUG #2268: initdb fails to initialize database
cluster with error "Access is denied"

Strange. It isn't a typical error we see, and the fact you see it on

two machines is even stranger. My guess is that somehow the
configuration on those two machines is the same and is causing the
failure.

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

James Hughes wrote:

The following bug has been logged online:

Bug reference: 2268
Logged by: James Hughes
Email address: james_hughes@mcafee.com
PostgreSQL version: 8.1.3
Operating system: Windows 2003 (Server)
Description: initdb fails to initialize database cluster

with

error

"Access is denied"
Details:

When we try and initialize a database cluster using initdb.exe we
are getting the following output.

-- OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --
The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user

"user1".

This user must also own the server process.

The database cluster will be initialized with locale English_United

Kingdom.1252.

creating directory c:/dataa ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/global ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_xlog/archive_status ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_clog ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/pg_subtrans ...
ok

creating directory c:/dataa/pg_twophase ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/members ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/pg_multixact/offsets ... ok creating directory
c:/dataa/base ... ok creating directory c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok
creating directory c:/dataa/pg_tblspc ... ok selecting default
max_connections ... Access

is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
10
selecting default shared_buffers ... Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
Access is denied.
50
creating configuration files ... ok creating template1 database in
c:/dataa/base/1 ... ok initializing pg_authid ... Access is denied.
child process was terminated by signal 1
initdb: removing data directory "c:/dataa"

-- end: OUTPUT from dbinit.exe --

user1 is a user without administrative rights. I have checked all
the directories and the user has permissons to write to the data
directory, and read other files it requires.

I also tried the Windows installer (MSI) from pgFoundry. This too is

having the same problem.

We have two machines which this problem occurs on, one of which
originally the initialization would work on. I have checked all the

user rights asssignments, and even given the postgres user (user1
in

the above output from dbinit.exe) all user rights.

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 2: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

--
Bruce Momjian http://candle.pha.pa.us
SRA OSS, Inc. http://www.sraoss.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

James Hughes

---------------------------(end of
broadcast)--------------------------- TIP 6: explain analyze is your
friend

---------------------------(end of broadcast)---------------------------
TIP 5: don't forget to increase your free space map settings

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback

Magnus Hagander

mha@sollentuna.net

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Noname (#7)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

All

I have determined what is causing the failure. It appears
that the stdout & stderr redirection to nul produces the
"Access is Denied."
message. This is happening even if I type "dir >nul" at the
command prompt! I assume that this re-direction in PostgreSQL
is done when starting postgres.exe as to allow the
communction between the two processes?

I know this is not the correct place to ask my next question
but maybe there is a Windows expert out there :o) Does anyone
have any idea how Windows controls access to devices such as
nul,comN, lpt1, etc? Or what security setting governs this?

Thanks all for your help.

Wow, that's really interesting. Never heard of that one before.

Can you run filemon and/or regmon from sysinternals.com, and see exactly
what object it gets access denied on?

Oh, and did you try this without antivirus/antispyware/personalfirewall
as I beleive someone suggested? Same result, or different but still
broken?

//Magnus

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback

Noname

James_Hughes@McAfee.com

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Magnus Hagander (#8)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

I did run filemon but did not get anything from it :( Yes I disabled all
anti-virus software, no difference made.

Have raised a helpdesk ticket with Microsoft, see if they can shed any
light on the problem.

James

-----Original Message-----
From: Magnus Hagander [mailto:mha@sollentuna.net]
Sent: 03 March 2006 14:14
To: Hughes, James; andrew@dunslane.net
Cc: pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: RE: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

All

I have determined what is causing the failure. It appears that the
stdout & stderr redirection to nul produces the "Access is Denied."
message. This is happening even if I type "dir >nul" at the command
prompt! I assume that this re-direction in PostgreSQL is done when
starting postgres.exe as to allow the communction between the two
processes?

I know this is not the correct place to ask my next question but maybe

there is a Windows expert out there :o) Does anyone have any idea how
Windows controls access to devices such as nul,comN, lpt1, etc? Or
what security setting governs this?

Thanks all for your help.

Wow, that's really interesting. Never heard of that one before.

Can you run filemon and/or regmon from sysinternals.com, and see exactly
what object it gets access denied on?

Oh, and did you try this without antivirus/antispyware/personalfirewall
as I beleive someone suggested? Same result, or different but still
broken?

//Magnus

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback

#10

Magnus Hagander

mha@sollentuna.net

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Noname (#9)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

I did run filemon but did not get anything from it :( Yes I
disabled all anti-virus software, no difference made.

Even more interesting. Do you have any other filter drivers that you
know of? SOme kind of quota stuff or so perhaps?

Oh, and if the bug is in the AV filter driver it's often not enough to
disable the AV - it has to be completely uninstalled. I've seen this
with several products wrt LSPs, and at least once with filterdrivers. So
that's also worth a try.

Have raised a helpdesk ticket with Microsoft, see if they can
shed any light on the problem.

Sounds good - since you can reproduce it with a simple commandline, they
should at least accept touching the case ;-)

//Magnus

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback

#11

Andrew Dunstan

andrew@dunslane.net

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Magnus Hagander (#10)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

Magnus Hagander wrote:

Have raised a helpdesk ticket with Microsoft, see if they can
shed any light on the problem.

Sounds good - since you can reproduce it with a simple commandline, they
should at least accept touching the case ;-)

In any case, since dir > nul fails, I think we can probably say it's Not
Our Problem (tm).

We've used nul on Windows ever since initdb was written in C.

cheers

andrew

#12

Noname

James_Hughes@McAfee.com

almost 20 years ago

In reply to: Andrew Dunstan (#11)

Re: Initdb on Windows 2003

I think we can safely say that it is not :-)

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Dunstan [mailto:andrew@dunslane.net]
Sent: 03 March 2006 15:41
To: Magnus Hagander
Cc: Hughes, James; pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org
Subject: Re: [HACKERS] Initdb on Windows 2003

Magnus Hagander wrote:

Have raised a helpdesk ticket with Microsoft, see if they can shed any

light on the problem.

Sounds good - since you can reproduce it with a simple commandline,
they should at least accept touching the case ;-)

In any case, since dir > nul fails, I think we can probably say it's Not
Our Problem (tm).

We've used nul on Windows ever since initdb was written in C.

cheers

andrew

Import Notes

Resolved by subject fallback