PG_DUMPALL(1)						  PostgreSQL Client Applications					     PG_DUMPALL(1)

NAME

       pg_dumpall - extract a PostgreSQL database cluster into a script file

SYNOPSIS

       pg_dumpall [ 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 a clus-
       ter.   pg_dumpall  also	dumps  global  objects	that  are common to all databases.  (pg_dump does not save these objects.)  This currently
       includes information about database users and groups, tablespaces, and properties such as access permissions that apply to databases  as  a
       whole.

       Since  pg_dumpall  reads  tables from all databases you will most likely have to connect as a database superuser in order to produce a com-
       plete dump. Also you will need superuser privileges to execute the saved script in order to be allowed to add users and groups, and to cre-
       ate databases.

       The SQL script will be written to the standard output. Shell operators should be used 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 in the documentation 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
	      Include SQL commands to clean (drop) databases before recreating them. DROP commands for roles and tablespaces are added as well.

       -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.

       -i

       --ignore-version
	      A deprecated option that is now ignored.

       -o

       --oids Dump object identifiers (OIDs) as part of the data for every table. Use this option if your application references the  OID  columns
	      in some way (e.g., in a foreign key constraint).	Otherwise, this option should not be used.

       -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.

       --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. (Allowed values vary
	      depending on the server version you are dumping from, but an integer number of milliseconds is accepted by all versions  since  7.3.
	      This option is ignored when dumping from a pre-7.3 server.)

       --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.

       -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 only relevant 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.  It will also enable verbose output in pg_dump.

       -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.

       --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.

       --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 only relevant 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 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 be careful to start the resulting script as a superuser.

       --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.

       The following command-line options control the database connection parameters.

       -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 to dump global objects and discover 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 authentica-
	      tion.   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 con-
	      necting 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

       This utility, like most other PostgreSQL utilities, also uses the environment variables supported by libpq (see in the documentation).

NOTES

       Since pg_dumpall calls pg_dump internally, some diagnostic messages will refer to pg_dump.

       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  ana-
       lyze all databases.

       pg_dumpall  requires  all needed tablespace directories to exist before the restore, else database creation will fail for databases in non-
       default locations.

EXAMPLES

       To dump all databases:

       $ pg_dumpall > db.out

       To reload this database use, for example:

       $ 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.)

SEE ALSO

       Check pg_dump(1) for details on possible error conditions.

Application							    2010-05-14							     PG_DUMPALL(1)