pg_restore
PG_RESTORE(1) PostgreSQL Client Applications PG_RESTORE(1)
NAME
pg_restore - restore a PostgreSQL database from an archive file cre-
ated by pg_dump
SYNOPSIS
pg_restore [ option... ] [ filename ]
DESCRIPTION
pg_restore is a utility for restoring a PostgreSQL database from an
archive created by pg_dump(1) in one of the non-plain-text formats. It
will issue the commands necessary to reconstruct the database to the
state it was in at the time it was saved. The archive files also allow
pg_restore to be selective about what is restored, or even to reorder
the items prior to being restored. The archive files are designed to
be portable across architectures.
pg_restore can operate in two modes: If a database name is specified,
the archive is restored directly into the database. (Large objects can
only be restored by using such a direct database connection.) Other-
wise, a script containing the SQL commands necessary to rebuild the
database is created (and written to a file or standard output), simi-
lar to the ones created by the pg_dump plain text format. Some of the
options controlling the script output are therefore analogous to
pg_dump options.
Obviously, pg_restore cannot restore information that is not present
in the archive file. For instance, if the archive was made using the
‘‘dump data as INSERT commands’’ option, pg_restore will not be able
to load the data using COPY statements.
OPTIONS
pg_restore accepts the following command line arguments.
filename
Specifies the location of the archive file to be restored. If
not specified, the standard input is used.
-a
--data-only
Restore only the data, not the schema (data definitions).
-c
--clean
Clean (drop) database objects before recreating them.
-C
--create
Create the database before restoring into it. (When this option
is used, the database named with -d is used only to issue the
initial CREATE DATABASE command. All data is restored into the
database name that appears in the archive.)
-d dbname
--dbname=dbname
Connect to database dbname and restore directly into the
database.
-f filename
--file=filename
Specify output file for generated script, or for the listing
when used with -l. Default is the standard output.
-F format
--format=format
Specify format of the archive. It is not necessary to specify
the format, since pg_restore will determine the format automat-
ically. If specified, it can be one of the following:
t The archive is a tar archive. Using this archive format
allows reordering and/or exclusion of schema elements at
the time the database is restored. It is also possible
to limit which data is reloaded at restore time.
c The archive is in the custom format of pg_dump. This is
the most flexible format in that it allows reordering of
data load as well as schema elements. This format is
also compressed by default.
-i
--ignore-version
Ignore database version checks.
-I index
--index=index
Restore definition of named index only.
-l
--list List the contents of the archive. The output of this operation
can be used with the -L option to restrict and reorder the
items that are restored.
-L list-file
--use-list=list-file
Restore elements in list-file only, and in the order they
appear in the file. Lines can be moved and may also be com-
mented out by placing a ; at the start of the line. (See below
for examples.)
-N
--orig-order
Restore items in the order they were originally generated
within pg_dump. This option has no known practical use, since
pg_dump generates the items in an order convenient to it, which
is unlikely to be a safe order for restoring them. (This is not
the order in which the items are ultimately listed in the
archive’s table of contents.) See also -r.
-o
--oid-order
Restore items in order by OID. This option is of limited use-
fulness, since OID is only an approximate indication of origi-
nal creation order. This option overrides -N if both are speci-
fied. See also -r.
-O
--no-owner
Do not output commands to set ownership of objects to match the
original database. By default, pg_restore issues SET SESSION
AUTHORIZATION statements to set ownership of created schema
elements. These statements will fail unless the initial con-
nection to the database is made by a superuser (or the same
user that owns all of the objects in the script). With -O, any
user name can be used for the initial connection, and this user
will own all the created objects.
-P function-name(argtype [, ...])
--function=function-name(argtype [, ...])
Restore the named function only. Be careful to spell the func-
tion name and arguments exactly as they appear in the dump
file’s table of contents.
-r
--rearrange
Rearrange items by object type (this occurs after the sorting
specified by -N or -o, if given). The rearrangement is intended
to give the best possible restore performance.
When none of -N, -o, and -r appear, pg_restore restores items
in the order they appear in the dump’s table of contents, or in
the order they appear in the list-file if -L is given. The com-
bination of -o and -r duplicates the sorting done by pg_dump
before creating the dump’s table of contents, and so it is nor-
mally unnecessary to specify it.
-R
--no-reconnect
This option is obsolete but still accepted for backwards com-
patibility.
-s
--schema-only
Restore only the schema (data definitions), not the data.
Sequence values will be reset.
-S username
--superuser=username
Specify the superuser user name to use when disabling triggers.
This is only relevant if --disable-triggers is used.
-t table
--table=table
Restore definition and/or data of named table only.
-T trigger
--trigger=trigger
Restore named trigger only.
-v
--verbose
Specifies verbose mode.
-x
--no-privileges
--no-acl
Prevent restoration of access privileges (grant/revoke com-
mands).
-X use-set-session-authorization
--use-set-session-authorization
This option is obsolete but still accepted for backwards com-
patibility. pg_restore now always behaves in the way formerly
selected by this option.
-X disable-triggers
--disable-triggers
This option is only relevant when performing a data-only
restore. It instructs pg_restore to execute commands to tem-
porarily disable triggers on the target tables while the data
is reloaded. Use this if you have referential integrity checks
or other triggers on the tables that you do not want to invoke
during data reload.
Presently, the commands emitted for --disable-triggers must be
done as superuser. So, you should also specify a superuser name
with -S, or preferably run pg_restore as a PostgreSQL supe-
ruser.
pg_restore also accepts the following command line arguments for con-
nection parameters:
-h host
--host=host
Specifies the host name of the machine on which the server is
running. If the value begins with a slash, it is used as the
directory for the Unix domain socket. The default is taken from
the PGHOST environment variable, if set, else a Unix domain
socket connection is attempted.
-p port
--port=port
Specifies the TCP port or local Unix domain socket file exten-
sion on which the server is listening for connections.
Defaults to the PGPORT environment variable, if set, or a com-
piled-in default.
-U username
Connect as the given user
-W Force a password prompt. This should happen automatically if
the server requires password authentication.
ENVIRONMENT
PGHOST
PGPORT
PGUSER Default connection parameters
DIAGNOSTICS
When a direct database connection is specified using the -d option,
pg_restore internally executes SQL statements. If you have problems
running pg_restore, make sure you are able to select information from
the database using, for example, psql.
NOTES
If your installation has any local additions to the template1
database, be careful to load the output of pg_restore into a truly
empty database; otherwise you are likely to get errors due to dupli-
cate definitions of the added objects. To make an empty database with-
out any local additions, copy from template0 not template1, for exam-
ple:
CREATE DATABASE foo WITH TEMPLATE template0;
The limitations of pg_restore are detailed below.
· When restoring data to a pre-existing table and the option --dis-
able-triggers is used, pg_restore emits commands to disable triggers
on user tables before inserting the data then emits commands to re-
enable them after the data has been inserted. If the restore is
stopped in the middle, the system catalogs may be left in the wrong
state.
· pg_restore will not restore large objects for a single table. If an
archive contains large objects, then all large objects will be
restored.
See also the pg_dump(1) documentation for details on limitations of
pg_dump.
Once restored, it is wise to run ANALYZE on each restored table so the
optimizer has useful statistics.
EXAMPLES
To dump a database called mydb that contains large objects to a tar
file:
$ pg_dump -Ft -b mydb > db.tar
To reload this database (with large objects) to an existing database
called newdb:
$ pg_restore -d newdb db.tar
To reorder database items, it is first necessary to dump the table of
contents of the archive:
$ pg_restore -l archive.file > archive.list
The listing file consists of a header and one line for each item,
e.g.,
;
; Archive created at Fri Jul 28 22:28:36 2000
; dbname: birds
; TOC Entries: 74
; Compression: 0
; Dump Version: 1.4-0
; Format: CUSTOM
;
;
; Selected TOC Entries:
;
2; 145344 TABLE species postgres
3; 145344 ACL species
4; 145359 TABLE nt_header postgres
5; 145359 ACL nt_header
6; 145402 TABLE species_records postgres
7; 145402 ACL species_records
8; 145416 TABLE ss_old postgres
9; 145416 ACL ss_old
10; 145433 TABLE map_resolutions postgres
11; 145433 ACL map_resolutions
12; 145443 TABLE hs_old postgres
13; 145443 ACL hs_old
Semicolons start a comment, and the numbers at the start of lines
refer to the internal archive ID assigned to each item.
Lines in the file can be commented out, deleted, and reordered. For
example,
10; 145433 TABLE map_resolutions postgres
;2; 145344 TABLE species postgres
;4; 145359 TABLE nt_header postgres
6; 145402 TABLE species_records postgres
;8; 145416 TABLE ss_old postgres
could be used as input to pg_restore and would only restore items 10
and 6, in that order:
$ pg_restore -L archive.list archive.file
HISTORY
The pg_restore utility first appeared in PostgreSQL 7.1.
SEE ALSO
pg_dump(1), pg_dumpall(1), psql(1)
Application 2008-01-03 PG_RESTORE(1)
