I installed the latest postgresql yesterday on a G4. I was able to import a database and successfully run a java application that uses it. I thought everything was great.
But then this morning I rebooted the mac and it won't start up. I just get the grey screen with the apple and the progress bar turning. I am not a "mac user" so i don't know where to begin. I couldn't get it to start in safe mode. I was able to get into single user mode but don't know what to do.
In the system log i see errors like SyndicationAGent crashed, mdimportserver crashed, illegal instruction, etc
Any help would be most appreciated
-ryan
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I'm not sure how the two could be related. Generally if a Mac fails like that, it's hard disk related. The only things PostgreSQL touches is a folder in the /Library folder called PostgreSQL8 , and a startup item called PostgreSQL in the StartupItems folder. Under no circumstances should it have altered anything relating to the boot process. Even if it was PostgreSQL, it should be failing MUCH later in the process.
If you boot into single user mode, running fsck -fy may resolve the issue. Google fsck and fsck_hfs for more information.
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I guess the next step would be to reset the root user password and see if things behave at that point, if that fails then it may well be PostgreSQL but I'm stumped at how it could be :-(.
Thanks for the replies...
From single user mode it doesn't even let me change the root password with "passwd root". It is weird it doesn't give me an error or anything i just get nothing. I can't really follow those instructions because they are from a shell and it doesn't seem to work in single user mode.
Does postgres mess with:
/System/Library/Frameworks/Foundation.framework/Versions/C/Foundation?
Because some of the errors seemed to be related to that
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FWIW, I never enable root, as it's not needed. Anything you need to do as root can be done from the Terminal using the sudo command, and if you really need a root shell, just do 'sudo bash'
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Unless something corrupted that file, that's unlikely to be the root cause. I really suspect that the root password change is causing it to fail authentication during startup. If the system is trying to process startupitems, it's parsing plists, so libxml has already been loaded at an earlier point.
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You are probably right, but i can't imagine why changing the root password would hurt anything. I change root passwords on linux boxes all the time. I really hope this thing isn't hosed. The only other thing i can think of is firefox went through and auto update while I was working on the computer but that should be irrelevant.
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I installed the latest postgresql yesterday on a G4. I was able to import a database and successfully run a java application that uses it. I thought everything was great.
But then this morning I rebooted the mac and it won't start up. I just get the grey screen with the apple and the progress bar turning. I am not a "mac user" so i don't know where to begin. I couldn't get it to start in safe mode. I was able to get into single user mode but don't know what to do.
In the system log i see errors like SyndicationAGent crashed, mdimportserver crashed, illegal instruction, etc
Any help would be most appreciated
-ryan
I'm not sure how the two could be related. Generally if a Mac fails like that, it's hard disk related. The only things PostgreSQL touches is a folder in the /Library folder called PostgreSQL8 , and a startup item called PostgreSQL in the StartupItems folder. Under no circumstances should it have altered anything relating to the boot process. Even if it was PostgreSQL, it should be failing MUCH later in the process.
If you boot into single user mode, running fsck -fy may resolve the issue. Google fsck and fsck_hfs for more information.
I tried fsck and it said everything was fine.
The only other thing I did was manually change the root passwd with "passwd root". Worked fine
When I try system startup from single user mode the first error is it can't start postgresql.
When I go into single user mode and boot from there i get "Couldn't find root user. Sleeping and Trying again" over and over.
Hmmm....
I guess the next step would be to reset the root user password and see if things behave at that point, if that fails then it may well be PostgreSQL but I'm stumped at how it could be :-(.
http://www.spy-hill.com/~myers/help/apple/EnableRoot.html has directions on clearing / resetting the root password.
I'm also going to try to reproduce the problems tonight on the Mac Mini. Is this a PPC or X86 Mac ?
Thanks for the replies...
From single user mode it doesn't even let me change the root password with "passwd root". It is weird it doesn't give me an error or anything i just get nothing. I can't really follow those instructions because they are from a shell and it doesn't seem to work in single user mode.
Does postgres mess with:
/System/Library/Frameworks/Foundation.framework/Versions/C/Foundation?
Because some of the errors seemed to be related to that
It does not. If you have your Mac OS X install disk, you can boot from it to get where you need to for reseting the password:
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20010324095804436
FWIW, I never enable root, as it's not needed. Anything you need to do as root can be done from the Terminal using the sudo command, and if you really need a root shell, just do 'sudo bash'
Ahh. well i am a Mac beginner but i know linux so i was just pretending i was in linux.
I think this might be my problem, although I have no idea how to fix it.
dyld: Library not loaded: /usr/lib/libxml2.2.dylib
Unless something corrupted that file, that's unlikely to be the root cause. I really suspect that the root password change is causing it to fail authentication during startup. If the system is trying to process startupitems, it's parsing plists, so libxml has already been loaded at an earlier point.
You are probably right, but i can't imagine why changing the root password would hurt anything. I change root passwords on linux boxes all the time. I really hope this thing isn't hosed. The only other thing i can think of is firefox went through and auto update while I was working on the computer but that should be irrelevant.