Settings¶
wal_level¶
Parameter description: Specifies the level of the information that is written to WALs.
Type: POSTMASTER
Value range: enumerated values
minimal
Advantages: Certain bulk operations (including creating tables and indexes, executing cluster operations, and copying tables) are safely skipped in logging, which can make those operations much faster.
Disadvantages: WALs only contain basic information required for the recovery from a database server crash or an emergency shutdown. Archived WALs cannot be used to restore data.
archive
Adds logging required for WAL archiving, supporting the database restoration from archives.
hot_standby
Further adds information required to run SQL queries on a standby server and takes effect after a server restart.
To enable read-only queries on a standby server, the wal_level parameter must be set to hot_standby on the primary server and the same value must be set on the standby server. There is little measurable difference in performance between using hot_standby and archive levels, so feedback is welcome if any production performance impacts are noticeable.
Default value: hot_standby
Important
To enable WAL archiving and data streaming replication between primary and standby servers, set this parameter to archive or hot_standby.
If this parameter is set to archive, hot_standby must be set to off. Otherwise, the database startup fails.
synchronous_commit¶
Parameter description: Specifies the synchronization mode of the current transaction.
Type: USERSET
Value range: enumerated values
on indicates synchronization logs of a standby server are flushed to disks.
off indicates asynchronous commit.
local indicates local commit.
remote_write indicates synchronization logs of a standby server are written to disks.
remote_receive indicates synchronization logs of a standby server are required to receive data.
Default value: on
wal_buffers¶
Parameter description: Specifies the number of XLOG_BLCKSZs used for storing WAL data. The size of each XLOG_BLCKSZ is 8 KB.
Type: POSTMASTER
Value range: -1 to 218. The unit is 8 KB.
If this parameter is set to -1, the value of wal_buffers is automatically changed to 1/32 of shared_buffers. The minimum value is 8 x XLOG_BLCKSZ, and the maximum value is 2048 x XLOG_BLCKSZ.
If it is set to a value smaller than 8, the value 8 is used. If it is set to a value greater than 2048, the value 2048 is used.
Default value: 256 MB
Setting suggestions: The content of WAL buffers is written to disks at each transaction commit, and setting this parameter to a large value does not significantly improve system performance. Setting this parameter to hundreds of megabytes can improve the disk writing performance on the server, to which a large number of transactions are committed. Based on experiences, the default value meets user requirements in most cases.
commit_delay¶
Parameter description: Specifies the duration of committed data be stored in the WAL buffer.
Type: USERSET
Value range: an integer, ranging from 0 to 100000 (unit: μs). 0 indicates no delay.
Default value: 0
Important
When this parameter is set to a value other than 0, the committed transaction is stored in the WAL buffer instead of being written to the WAL immediately. Then, the WalWriter process flushes the buffer out to disks periodically.
If system load is high, other transactions are probably ready to be committed within the delay. If no transactions are waiting to be submitted, the delay is a waste of time.
commit_siblings¶
Parameter description: Specifies a limit on the number of ongoing transactions. If the number of ongoing transactions is greater than the limit, a new transaction will wait for the period of time specified by commit_delay before it is submitted. If the number of ongoing transactions is less than the limit, the new transaction is immediately written into a WAL.
Type: USERSET
Value range: an integer ranging from 0 to 1000
Default value: 5
wal_compression¶
Parameter description: Specifies whether to compress FPI pages.
Type: USERSET
Value range: Boolean
on: enable the compression
off: disable the compression
Default value: on
Important
Only zlib compression algorithm is supported.
For clusters that are upgraded to the current version from an earlier version, this parameter is set to off by default. You can run the gs_guc command to enable the FPI compression function if needed.
If the current version is a newly installed version, this parameter is set to on by default.
If this parameter is manually enabled for a cluster upgraded from an earlier version, the cluster cannot be rolled back.
wal_compression_level¶
Parameter description: Specifies the compression level of zlib compression algorithm when the wal_compression parameter is enabled.
Type: USERSET
Value range: an integer ranging from 0 to 9.
0 indicates no compression.
1 indicates the lowest compression ratio.
9 indicates the highest compression ratio.
Default value: 9