Mark Steben wrote:
>
> HI,
>
> Quick question:  our master node runs postgres 8.2.5 in Massachusetts
>
> Our proposed slave node runs postgres 8.3.3 in Virginia
>
> Do we need to upgrade our master to 8.3 in order to successfully run 
> slony?
>
> I have been testing on similar nodes with slony 1.2.14.
>
>  
>
One of the official "use cases" of Slony-I is to do upgrades, so there 
shouldn't be any notable problems with doing this.

It is possible to get "bitten" by differences between 8.2 and 8.3; 
that's inherent to having a mixed environment, and not to Slony-I itself.

Between 7.4 and 8.0 (if memory serves) there were changes in the 
handling of Unicode validation; there would be a risk, between *those* 
versions, of the 7.4 instance accepting some invalid Unicode that the 
8.0 (or newer) instance would (correctly) not accept.  That's not a 
problem you'd experience with your versions, but that's the sort of 
thing I'd be at least a little wary of.

I know that the DBAs I work with would be aghast at the thought of 
running apps against variant versions of PostgreSQL for any long term 
period of time, but again, that's not a Slony-I issue as much as a 
general issue surrounding the proliferation of varying versions of 
things in the environment.  More versions of *anything* means more 
"spinning plates" in the air.   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_spinning

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Christopher Browne
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