How to thoroughly purge and reinstall postgresql on ubuntu

Question

Somehow I ve managed to completely bugger the install of postgresql on Ubuntu karmic   I want to start over from scratch  but when I  purge  the package with apt-get it still leaves traces behind such that the reinstall configuration doesn t run properly   After I ve done   apt-get purge postgresql apt-get install postgresql   It said  Setting up postgresql-8 4  8 4 3-0ubuntu9 10 1      Configuring already existing cluster  configuration   etc postgresql 8 4 main  data   var lib postgresql 8 4 main  owner  108 112  Error  move conffile  required configuration file      var lib postgresql 8 4 main postgresql conf does not exist Error  could not create default cluster  Please create it manually with    pg createcluster 8 4 main --start  or a similar command  see  man pg createcluster    update-alternatives  using  usr share postgresql 8 4 man man1 postmaster 1 gz to provide  usr share man man1 postmaster 1 gz  postmaster 1 gz  in auto mode   Setting up postgresql  8 4 3-0ubuntu9 10 1        I have a   etc postgresql  with nothing in it and   etc postgresql-common   has a  pg upgradecluser d  directory and root crt and user clusters files   The  etc passwd has a postgres user  the purge script doesn t appear to touch it   There s been a bunch of symptoms which I work through only to expose the next    Right this second  when I run that command  pg createcluster     it complains that   var lib postgresql 8 4 main postgresql conf does not exist   so I ll go find one of those but I m sure that won t be the end of it   Is there not some easy one-liner  or two  which will burn it completely and let me start over

User · Answer

Following ae the steps i followed to uninstall and reinstall. Which worked for me.

First remove the installed postgres :-

sudo apt-get purge postgr*

sudo apt-get autoremove

Then install 'synaptic':

sudo apt-get install synaptic

sudo apt-get update

Then install postgres

sudo apt-get install postgresql postgresql-contrib

User · Answer

I was facing same problem in my ubuntu 16 04  but i fixed that problem and it s very simple just follow these step and you will be able to install postgresql 10 in your system    Add this to your sources list   sudo vim  etc apt sources list  deb http   ftp de debian org debian  wheezy main non-free contrib  deb-src http   ftp de debian org debian  wheezy main non-free contrib   after that add these link to your pgdg list file if it s not there you have to create  amp  amp  add link  amp  amp  save it   sudo vim  etc apt sources list d pgdg list  deb http   apt postgresql org pub repos apt  xenial-pgdg main  deb http   apt postgresql org pub repos apt  precise-pgdg main   then update your system  sudo apt-get update  sudo apt-get upgrade   and install that unmet dependencies    apt-get install ssl-cert   that s it  now Install postgresql using these command  sudo apt-get install postgresql-10

User · Answer

I was following the replies  When editing  etc group I also deleted this line   ssl-cert x 112 postgres   then  when trying to install postgresql  I got this error   Preconfiguring packages     dpkg  unrecoverable fatal error  aborting   syntax error  unknown group  ssl-cert  in statoverride file E  Sub-process  usr bin dpkg returned an error code  2    Putting the  ssl-cert x 112 postgres  line back in  etc group seems to fix it  so I was able to install postgresql

User · Answer

I know an answer has already been provided  but dselect didn t work for me  Here is what worked to find the packages to remove     search postgr    grep  i i   postgresql                      - object-relational SQL database  supported  i A postgresql-8 4                  - object-relational SQL database  version 8  i A postgresql-client-8 4           - front-end programs for PostgreSQL 8 4      i A postgresql-client-common        - manager for multiple PostgreSQL client ver i A postgresql-common               - PostgreSQL database-cluster manager           aptitude purge postgresql-8 4 postgresql-client-8 4 postgresql-client-common postgresql-common postgresql  rm -r  etc postgresql  rm -r  etc postgresql-common  rm -r  var lib postgresql    Finally  editing  etc passwd and  etc group

User · Answer

Option A  If your install isn t already damaged  you can drop unwanted PostgreSQL servers   clusters   using pg dropcluster  Use that in preference to a full purge and reinstall if you just want to restart with a fresh PostgreSQL instance     pg lsclusters Ver Cluster Port Status Owner    Data directory              Log file 11  main    5432 online postgres  var lib postgresql 11 main  var log postgresql postgresql-11-main log   sudo systemctl stop postgresql 11-main   sudo pg dropcluster --stop 11 main   sudo pg createcluster --start 11 main   Option B  If you really need to do a full purge and reinstall  first make sure PostgreSQL isn t running  ps -C postgres should show no results   Now run   apt-get --purge remove postgresql     to remove everything PostgreSQL from your system  Just purging the postgres package isn t enough since it s just an empty meta-package   Once all PostgreSQL packages have been removed  run   rm -r  etc postgresql  rm -r  etc postgresql-common  rm -r  var lib postgresql  userdel -r postgres groupdel postgres   You should now be able to   apt-get install postgresql   or for a complete install   apt-get install postgresql-8 4 postgresql-contrib-8 4 postgresql-doc-8 4

User · Answer

I had a similar situation  I needed to purge postgresql 9 1 on a debian wheezy   I had previously migrated from 8 4 and I was getting errors      What I did   First  I deleted config and database    sudo pg dropcluster --stop 9 1 main   Then removed postgresql    sudo apt-get remove --purge postgresql postgresql-9 1    and then reinstalled    sudo apt-get install postgresql postgresql-9 1   In my case I noticed  etc postgresql 9 1 was empty  and running service postgresql start returned nothing   So  after more googling I got to this command     sudo pg createcluster 9 1 main   With that I could start the server  but now I was getting log-related errors  After more searching  I ended up changing permissions to the  var log postgresql directory    sudo chown root postgres  var log postgresql   sudo chmod g wx  var log postgresql   That fixed the issue  Hope this helps

User · Answer

apt-get purge postgresql    is enough

User · Answer

I just ran into the same issue for Ubuntu 13 04  These commands removed Postgres 9 1   sudo apt-get purge postgresql sudo apt-get autoremove postgresql   It occurs to me that perhaps only the second command is necessary  but from there I was able to install Postgres 9 2  sudo apt-get install postgresql-9 2

User · Answer

Steps that worked for me on Ubuntu 8 04 2 to remove postgres 8 3   List All Postgres related packages  dpkg -l   grep postgres  ii  postgresql                            8 3 17-0ubuntu0 8 04 1           object-relational SQL database  latest versi ii  postgresql-8 3                        8 3 9-0ubuntu8 04                object-relational SQL database  version 8 3 ii  postgresql-client                     8 3 9-0ubuntu8 04                front-end programs for PostgreSQL  latest ve ii  postgresql-client-8 3                 8 3 9-0ubuntu8 04                front-end programs for PostgreSQL 8 3 ii  postgresql-client-common              87ubuntu2                        manager for multiple PostgreSQL client versi ii  postgresql-common                     87ubuntu2                        PostgreSQL database-cluster manager ii  postgresql-contrib                    8 3 9-0ubuntu8 04                additional facilities for PostgreSQL  latest ii  postgresql-contrib-8 3                8 3 9-0ubuntu8 04                additional facilities for PostgreSQL  Remove all above listed  sudo apt-get --purge remove postgresql postgresql-8 3  postgresql-client  postgresql-client-8 3 postgresql-client-common postgresql-common  postgresql-contrib postgresql-contrib-8 3  Remove the following folders  sudo rm -rf  var lib postgresql  sudo rm -rf  var log postgresql  sudo rm -rf  etc postgresql

[postgresql] How to thoroughly purge and reinstall postgresql on ubuntu?

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