Roy's Techblog

Unfortunately, out of the box, the postgres gem fails to install with the MacPorts postgres82-server install. There are two problems. The first is it can’t find pg_config. The second is incorrect architecture detection (thanks to Andreas Flierl at the RubyForge postgres module forums for pointing out the fix).

ERROR:  Error installing postgres:
    ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension.

/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/bin/ruby extconf.rb install postgres
extconf.rb:73: command not found: pg_config --bindir

The fix for this one is to fix the path temporarily:

 export PATH=/opt/local/lib/postgresql82/bin/:$PATH

Then when we retry the gem installation, we’ll get the following error(s):

postgres.c:41: error: static declaration of ‘PQserverVersion’ follows non-static declaration
/opt/local/include/postgresql82/libpq-fe.h:262: error: previous declaration of ‘PQserverVersion’ was here
postgres.c:41: error: static declaration of ‘PQserverVersion’ follows non-static declaration
/opt/local/include/postgresql82/libpq-fe.h:262: error: previous declaration of ‘PQserverVersion’ was here
postgres.c: In function ‘Init_postgres’:
postgres.c:2676: error: ‘pgconn_protocol_version’ undeclared (first use in this function)
postgres.c:2676: error: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once
postgres.c:2676: error: for each function it appears in.)
postgres.c:2677: error: ‘pgconn_server_version’ undeclared (first use in this function)
postgres.c: In function ‘Init_postgres’:
postgres.c:2676: error: ‘pgconn_protocol_version’ undeclared (first use in this function)
postgres.c:2676: error: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once
postgres.c:2676: error: for each function it appears in.)
postgres.c:2677: error: ‘pgconn_server_version’ undeclared (first use in this function)
lipo: can't open input file: /var/tmp//ccBatpen.out (No such file or directory)
make: *** [postgres.o] Error 1

These are fixed by specifying a specific architecture to use.

The following commands worked well for me:

export PATH=/opt/local/lib/postgresql82/bin/:$PATH
sudo env ARCHFLAGS="-arch i386" gem install --remote postgres

After installing the Mac Ports postgresql82-server port, I tried to make it run. It didn’t. The problem was that su didn’t like running anything as user postgres. Here’s the original instructions:

###########################################################
# A startup item has been generated that will aid in
# starting postgresql82-server with launchd. It is disabled
# by default. Execute the following command to start it,
# and to cause it to launch at startup:
#
# sudo launchctl load -w  /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.postgresql82-server.plist 
###########################################################  
--->  Installing postgresql82-server 8.2.6_0

To create a database instance, after install do
 sudo mkdir -p /opt/local/var/db/postgresql82/defaultdb
 sudo chown postgres:postgres  /opt/local/var/db/postgresql82/defaultdb 
 sudo su postgres -c '/opt/local/lib/postgresql82/bin/initdb -D  /opt/local/var/db/postgresql82/defaultdb'

And here’s my test to determine if su was working:

 sudo su postgres -c id

I got no output… So I tried

 sudo -u postgres id

And I get:

 uid=401(postgres) gid=401(postgres) groups=401(postgres)

So now what?

There’s an easy way to deal with this: Grab the server admin tools from Apple and install them.

Next, fire up Workgroup Manager (its in your /Applications/Server folder). Ignore the dialog and go straight to the menu and select Server -> View Directories. Select the PostgreSQL Server user in the left-hand pane, then select the Advanced tab and change the Login Shell to something like /bin/sh. See the picture for details. Don’t forget to hit Save.

Now the command from before works:

# sudo su postgres -c id
uid=401(postgres) gid=401(postgres) groups=401(postgres)

So now we can finish the last step to initialize the database, then fire up Postgres.

  sudo su postgres -c '/opt/local/lib/postgresql82/bin/initdb -D /opt/local/var/db/postgresql82/defaultdb'

If you already ran the launchctl command, you can make Postgres start with these two commands:

 sudo launchctl unload -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.postgresql82-server.plist
 sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.postgresql82-server.plist

Otherwise just run the load version of the command.