PostgreSQL with docker ownership issue

Question

Since yesterday, I try to launch my docker project on Windows (Bootcamp MacBook Pro), and I have just one issue left : PostgreSQL image.

Error message :

postgres_1         | The files belonging to this database system will be owned by user "postgres".
postgres_1         | This user must also own the server process.
postgres_1         |
postgres_1         | The database cluster will be initialized with locale "en_US.utf8".
postgres_1         | The default database encoding has accordingly been set to "UTF8".
postgres_1         | The default text search configuration will be set to "english".
postgres_1         |
postgres_1         | Data page checksums are disabled.
postgres_1         |
postgres_1         | fixing permissions on existing directory /var/lib/postgresql/data ... ok
postgres_1         | creating subdirectories ... ok
postgres_1         | selecting default max_connections ... 20
postgres_1         | selecting default shared_buffers ... 400kB
postgres_1         | selecting dynamic shared memory implementation ... posix
postgres_1         | creating configuration files ... ok
postgres_1         | 2019-01-22 16:57:37.016 UTC [79] FATAL:  data directory "/var/lib/postgresql/data" has wrong ownership
postgres_1         | 2019-01-22 16:57:37.016 UTC [79] HINT:  The server must be started by the user that owns the data directory.
postgres_1         | child process exited with exit code 1
postgres_1         | initdb: removing contents of data directory "/var/lib/postgresql/data"
postgres_1         | running bootstrap script ... kibati-docker_postgres_1 exited with code 1

I've searched everywhere, tried everything, and still have this issue…

What I tried is :

• Create docker volume with docker volume create --name postgres -d local and use it in my docker-compose.yml

docker-compose.yml

version: '2'

services:
  postgres:
    image: postgres:latest
    ports:
      - "5432:5432"
    volumes:
      - postgres:/var/lib/postgresql/data

  networks:
    internal_ip:
      ipv4_address: 192.168.1.2

  volumes:
    postgres:
      external: true

• Add volume directly in docker compose

volume sample

volumes:
  postgres:
    driver: local

• Using relative or absolute Windows paths
• Declare multiple volumes for differents PostgreSQL folders (conf, data…)

I tried to docker compose down, restart computer, remove images, nothing change, same error.

I already checked Shared Drive box in Docker Settings.

Sources of what I've tried :

https://glennsarti.github.io/blog/puppet-in-docker/

https://forums.docker.com/t/trying-to-get-postgres-to-work-on-persistent-windows-mount-two-issues/12456/5

https://forums.docker.com/t/data-directory-var-lib-postgresql-data-pgdata-has-wrong-ownership/17963/28

https://github.com/docker-library/postgres/issues/435

http://www.lukaszewczak.com/2016/09/run-postgresql-using-docker-with.html

https://gdevops.gitlab.io/tuto_docker/tutoriels/postgresql/postgresql.html

https://devask.cz/questions/48645804/mount-postgres-data-to-windows-host-directory

Is anyone as a working solution ? I will continue to make it work, and update post if I found Something.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

I've finally figured out what went wrong when I tried to use a volume for PostgreSQL data.

I had no idea that we used a docker-compose.override.yml, which declare a volume with a Windows path.

So here is a working solution to have PostgreSQL on Docker for Windows, with persisted data :

version: '2'

services:
  postgres:
    image: postgres:11.5
    ports:
      - 5432:5432
    volumes: 
      - pgdata:/var/lib/postgresql/data
      - pgconf:/etc/postgresql
      - pglog:/var/log/postgresql

volumes:
  pgdata:
    driver: local
  pgconf:
    driver: local
  pglog: 
    driver: local

(no additional command required)