PostgreSQL 12 High Availability Cookbook - Third Edition

Copying WAL files more easily

If we have a version of PostgreSQL of 9.2 or above, there is a new command that, much like pg_basebackup, utilizes the replication mechanism for a new purpose. Assuming PostgreSQL is configured as described in the Configuration – getting it right the first time recipe, there should be several available replication streams. As we've planned ahead and have a dual-node cluster, we are already using at least one to create a copy of the database.

The next step is to focus on the safety of the WAL files, as they are critical to PITR. Instead of using rsync to copy these between nodes, we can simply pull them directly from the primary node. With 192.168.1.30 as the virtual database IP address and rep_user as the name ...