Trouble establishing a dialogue between Perl and PostgreSQL

DigitalKitty has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hi all.

I recently upgraded my PostgreSQL install to version 8.2.6 (win32). After doing so, I installed the following modules (DBI was installed previously).

When attempting to connect to a database with DBD::Pg, the connection hung and only by pressing Ctrl-C was I able to terminate the program.

Assuming something might be wrong with the module, I tried DBD::PgPP in a very simple test script (please see below):

#!/usr/bin/perl
use warnings;
use strict;
use DBI;

my $db = DBI->connect('dbi:PgPP:testdb', 'postgres', 'xxxxxxxxx');

if( $db ) { 
   print "Connected!\n";
}

else {
   print "Nope. Sorry.\n";
}
[download]

After doing so, I immediately noticed the following message:

C:\Perl2\bin>perl test_pg.pl
DBI connect('testdb','postgres',...) failed: Couldn't connect to /tmp/
+.s.PGSQL.5432: at C:/Perl2/site/lib/DBD/PgPP.pm line 124 at test_pg.p
+l line 5
[download]

Is there a configuration setting I need to modify? For testing purposes, I was able to connect to the database with both python and ruby.

Thanks,

~Katie

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Re: Trouble establishing a dialogue between Perl and PostgreSQL by talexb (Chancellor) on Jan 14, 2008 at 21:15 UTC
Under Linux (the Windows locations will, no doubt, vary) I usually have to go into `/var/lib/pgsql/data/` and modify `pg_hba.conf` (to allow local access without authentication) and `postgresql.conf` (to allow a connection using sockets). And, of course, if this is a new installation I have to run the service script with `initdb` before the service itself can be started. You platform may vary. Alex / talexb / Toronto "Groklaw is the open-source mentality applied to legal research" ~ Linus Torvalds	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Trouble establishing a dialogue between Perl and PostgreSQL by erix (Prior) on Jan 14, 2008 at 21:08 UTC
I wouldn't bother with that old unmaintained DBD::PgPP if not necessary. For DBD::Pg, which is very actively maintained, there is a ppm/binary for DBD::Pg here: http://pgfoundry.org/projects/dbdpgppm/ If you download a local copy and give the local directory to PPM, it should install it without problem. If some problem persists, don't assume the module DBD::Pg is at fault, it's probably something else: read the postgres log, it will probably bring enlightenment. ~~Ah, and by the way: PostgreSQL 8.3 Release Candidate 1 is out! You may want to try that - it is already very stable, and full of new goodies: see release notes for 8.3.~~ ~~For win32: v8.3RC1 binaries~~ update: 8.3 binaries ( PostgreSQL 8.3 was released 4 february 2008 ).	[reply]
Re: Trouble establishing a dialogue between Perl and PostgreSQL by olus (Curate) on Jan 14, 2008 at 20:47 UTC
Maybe you need to specify that you are connecting to localhost, and you mustn't forget about dbname. `my $db=DBI->connect("dbi:PgPP:dbname=testdb;host=localhost", 'postgres +','xxxxxxxxx') or die DBI->errstr;` [download] Hope that helps.	[reply] [d/l]