PG_DUMPALL(1) PostgreSQL 15.7 Documentation PG_DUMPALL(1)
NAME
pg_dumpall - extract a PostgreSQL database cluster into a script file
SYNOPSIS
pg_dumpall [connection-option...] [option...]
DESCRIPTION
pg_dumpall is a utility for writing out (“dumping”) all PostgreSQL
databases of a cluster into one script file. The script file contains
SQL commands that can be used as input to psql(1) to restore the
databases. It does this by calling pg_dump(1) for each database in the
cluster. pg_dumpall also dumps global objects that are common to all
databases, namely database roles, tablespaces, and privilege grants for
configuration parameters. (pg_dump does not save these objects.)
Since pg_dumpall reads tables from all databases you will most likely
have to connect as a database superuser in order to produce a complete
dump. Also you will need superuser privileges to execute the saved
script in order to be allowed to add roles and create databases.
The SQL script will be written to the standard output. Use the
-f/--file option or shell operators to redirect it into a file.
pg_dumpall needs to connect several times to the PostgreSQL server
(once per database). If you use password authentication it will ask for
a password each time. It is convenient to have a ~/.pgpass file in such
cases. See Section 34.16 for more information.
OPTIONS
The following command-line options control the content and format of
the output.
-a
--data-only
Dump only the data, not the schema (data definitions).
-c
--clean
Emit SQL commands to DROP all the dumped databases, roles, and
tablespaces before recreating them. This option is useful when the
restore is to overwrite an existing cluster. If any of the objects
do not exist in the destination cluster, ignorable error messages
will be reported during restore, unless --if-exists is also
specified.
-E encoding
--encoding=encoding
Create the dump in the specified character set encoding. By
default, the dump is created in the database encoding. (Another way
to get the same result is to set the PGCLIENTENCODING environment
variable to the desired dump encoding.)
-f filename
--file=filename
Send output to the specified file. If this is omitted, the standard
output is used.
-g
--globals-only
Dump only global objects (roles and tablespaces), no databases.
-O
--no-owner
Do not output commands to set ownership of objects to match the
original database. By default, pg_dumpall issues ALTER OWNER or SET
SESSION AUTHORIZATION statements to set ownership of created schema
elements. These statements will fail when the script is run unless
it is started by a superuser (or the same user that owns all of the
objects in the script). To make a script that can be restored by
any user, but will give that user ownership of all the objects,
specify -O.
-r
--roles-only
Dump only roles, no databases or tablespaces.
-s
--schema-only
Dump only the object definitions (schema), not data.
-S username
--superuser=username
Specify the superuser user name to use when disabling triggers.
This is relevant only if --disable-triggers is used. (Usually, it's
better to leave this out, and instead start the resulting script as
superuser.)
-t
--tablespaces-only
Dump only tablespaces, no databases or roles.
-v
--verbose
Specifies verbose mode. This will cause pg_dumpall to output
start/stop times to the dump file, and progress messages to
standard error. Repeating the option causes additional debug-level
messages to appear on standard error. The option is also passed
down to pg_dump.
-V
--version
Print the pg_dumpall version and exit.
-x
--no-privileges
--no-acl
Prevent dumping of access privileges (grant/revoke commands).
--binary-upgrade
This option is for use by in-place upgrade utilities. Its use for
other purposes is not recommended or supported. The behavior of the
option may change in future releases without notice.
--column-inserts
--attribute-inserts
Dump data as INSERT commands with explicit column names (INSERT
INTO table (column, ...) VALUES ...). This will make restoration
very slow; it is mainly useful for making dumps that can be loaded
into non-PostgreSQL databases.
--disable-dollar-quoting
This option disables the use of dollar quoting for function bodies,
and forces them to be quoted using SQL standard string syntax.
--disable-triggers
This option is relevant only when creating a data-only dump. It
instructs pg_dumpall to include commands to temporarily disable
triggers on the target tables while the data is restored. Use this
if you have referential integrity checks or other triggers on the
tables that you do not want to invoke during data restore.
Presently, the commands emitted for --disable-triggers must be done
as superuser. So, you should also specify a superuser name with -S,
or preferably be careful to start the resulting script as a
superuser.
--exclude-database=pattern
Do not dump databases whose name matches pattern. Multiple patterns
can be excluded by writing multiple --exclude-database switches.
The pattern parameter is interpreted as a pattern according to the
same rules used by psql's \d commands (see Patterns below), so
multiple databases can also be excluded by writing wildcard
characters in the pattern. When using wildcards, be careful to
quote the pattern if needed to prevent shell wildcard expansion.
--extra-float-digits=ndigits
Use the specified value of extra_float_digits when dumping
floating-point data, instead of the maximum available precision.
Routine dumps made for backup purposes should not use this option.
--if-exists
Use DROP ... IF EXISTS commands to drop objects in --clean mode.
This suppresses “does not exist” errors that might otherwise be
reported. This option is not valid unless --clean is also
specified.
--inserts
Dump data as INSERT commands (rather than COPY). This will make
restoration very slow; it is mainly useful for making dumps that
can be loaded into non-PostgreSQL databases. Note that the restore
might fail altogether if you have rearranged column order. The
--column-inserts option is safer, though even slower.
--load-via-partition-root
When dumping data for a table partition, make the COPY or INSERT
statements target the root of the partitioning hierarchy that
contains it, rather than the partition itself. This causes the
appropriate partition to be re-determined for each row when the
data is loaded. This may be useful when restoring data on a server
where rows do not always fall into the same partitions as they did
on the original server. That could happen, for example, if the
partitioning column is of type text and the two systems have
different definitions of the collation used to sort the
partitioning column.
--lock-wait-timeout=timeout
Do not wait forever to acquire shared table locks at the beginning
of the dump. Instead, fail if unable to lock a table within the
specified timeout. The timeout may be specified in any of the
formats accepted by SET statement_timeout.
--no-comments
Do not dump comments.
--no-publications
Do not dump publications.
--no-role-passwords
Do not dump passwords for roles. When restored, roles will have a
null password, and password authentication will always fail until
the password is set. Since password values aren't needed when this
option is specified, the role information is read from the catalog
view pg_roles instead of pg_authid. Therefore, this option also
helps if access to pg_authid is restricted by some security policy.
--no-security-labels
Do not dump security labels.
--no-subscriptions
Do not dump subscriptions.
--no-sync
By default, pg_dumpall will wait for all files to be written safely
to disk. This option causes pg_dumpall to return without waiting,
which is faster, but means that a subsequent operating system crash
can leave the dump corrupt. Generally, this option is useful for
testing but should not be used when dumping data from production
installation.
--no-table-access-method
Do not output commands to select table access methods. With this
option, all objects will be created with whichever table access
method is the default during restore.
--no-tablespaces
Do not output commands to create tablespaces nor select tablespaces
for objects. With this option, all objects will be created in
whichever tablespace is the default during restore.
--no-toast-compression
Do not output commands to set TOAST compression methods. With this
option, all columns will be restored with the default compression
setting.
--no-unlogged-table-data
Do not dump the contents of unlogged tables. This option has no
effect on whether or not the table definitions (schema) are dumped;
it only suppresses dumping the table data.
--on-conflict-do-nothing
Add ON CONFLICT DO NOTHING to INSERT commands. This option is not
valid unless --inserts or --column-inserts is also specified.
--quote-all-identifiers
Force quoting of all identifiers. This option is recommended when
dumping a database from a server whose PostgreSQL major version is
different from pg_dumpall's, or when the output is intended to be
loaded into a server of a different major version. By default,
pg_dumpall quotes only identifiers that are reserved words in its
own major version. This sometimes results in compatibility issues
when dealing with servers of other versions that may have slightly
different sets of reserved words. Using --quote-all-identifiers
prevents such issues, at the price of a harder-to-read dump script.
--rows-per-insert=nrows
Dump data as INSERT commands (rather than COPY). Controls the
maximum number of rows per INSERT command. The value specified must
be a number greater than zero. Any error during restoring will
cause only rows that are part of the problematic INSERT to be lost,
rather than the entire table contents.
--use-set-session-authorization
Output SQL-standard SET SESSION AUTHORIZATION commands instead of
ALTER OWNER commands to determine object ownership. This makes the
dump more standards compatible, but depending on the history of the
objects in the dump, might not restore properly.
-?
--help
Show help about pg_dumpall command line arguments, and exit.
The following command-line options control the database connection
parameters.
-d connstr
--dbname=connstr
Specifies parameters used to connect to the server, as a connection
string; these will override any conflicting command line options.
The option is called --dbname for consistency with other client
applications, but because pg_dumpall needs to connect to many
databases, the database name in the connection string will be
ignored. Use the -l option to specify the name of the database used
for the initial connection, which will dump global objects and
discover what other databases should be dumped.
-h host
--host=host
Specifies the host name of the machine on which the database 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.
-l dbname
--database=dbname
Specifies the name of the database to connect to for dumping global
objects and discovering what other databases should be dumped. If
not specified, the postgres database will be used, and if that does
not exist, template1 will be used.
-p port
--port=port
Specifies the TCP port or local Unix domain socket file extension
on which the server is listening for connections. Defaults to the
PGPORT environment variable, if set, or a compiled-in default.
-U username
--username=username
User name to connect as.
-w
--no-password
Never issue a password prompt. If the server requires password
authentication and a password is not available by other means such
as a .pgpass file, the connection attempt will fail. This option
can be useful in batch jobs and scripts where no user is present to
enter a password.
-W
--password
Force pg_dumpall to prompt for a password before connecting to a
database.
This option is never essential, since pg_dumpall will automatically
prompt for a password if the server demands password
authentication. However, pg_dumpall will waste a connection attempt
finding out that the server wants a password. In some cases it is
worth typing -W to avoid the extra connection attempt.
Note that the password prompt will occur again for each database to
be dumped. Usually, it's better to set up a ~/.pgpass file than to
rely on manual password entry.
--role=rolename
Specifies a role name to be used to create the dump. This option
causes pg_dumpall to issue a SET ROLE rolename command after
connecting to the database. It is useful when the authenticated
user (specified by -U) lacks privileges needed by pg_dumpall, but
can switch to a role with the required rights. Some installations
have a policy against logging in directly as a superuser, and use
of this option allows dumps to be made without violating the
policy.
ENVIRONMENT
PGHOST
PGOPTIONS
PGPORT
PGUSER
Default connection parameters
PG_COLOR
Specifies whether to use color in diagnostic messages. Possible
values are always, auto and never.
This utility, like most other PostgreSQL utilities, also uses the
environment variables supported by libpq (see Section 34.15).
NOTES
Since pg_dumpall calls pg_dump internally, some diagnostic messages
will refer to pg_dump.
The --clean option can be useful even when your intention is to restore
the dump script into a fresh cluster. Use of --clean authorizes the
script to drop and re-create the built-in postgres and template1
databases, ensuring that those databases will retain the same
properties (for instance, locale and encoding) that they had in the
source cluster. Without the option, those databases will retain their
existing database-level properties, as well as any pre-existing
contents.
Once restored, it is wise to run ANALYZE on each database so the
optimizer has useful statistics. You can also run vacuumdb -a -z to
analyze all databases.
The dump script should not be expected to run completely without
errors. In particular, because the script will issue CREATE ROLE for
every role existing in the source cluster, it is certain to get a “role
already exists” error for the bootstrap superuser, unless the
destination cluster was initialized with a different bootstrap
superuser name. This error is harmless and should be ignored. Use of
the --clean option is likely to produce additional harmless error
messages about non-existent objects, although you can minimize those by
adding --if-exists.
pg_dumpall requires all needed tablespace directories to exist before
the restore; otherwise, database creation will fail for databases in
non-default locations.
EXAMPLES
To dump all databases:
$ pg_dumpall > db.out
To restore database(s) from this file, you can use:
$ psql -f db.out postgres
It is not important to which database you connect here since the script
file created by pg_dumpall will contain the appropriate commands to
create and connect to the saved databases. An exception is that if you
specified --clean, you must connect to the postgres database initially;
the script will attempt to drop other databases immediately, and that
will fail for the database you are connected to.
SEE ALSO
Check pg_dump(1) for details on possible error conditions.
PostgreSQL 15.7 2024 PG_DUMPALL(1)
Generated by dwww version 1.15 on Sat Jun 29 02:34:13 CEST 2024.