pg_upgradecluster fails: "could not get cluster locales"

[Victor-Philipp]

We upgrade a 12.04 LTS to 14.04 LTS and use the pg_upgradecluster command(usage as described in /usr/share/doc/README.Debian.gz). But we get a failure an no upgrade is done:

pg_dropcluster 9.3 main --stop

pg_upgradecluster 9.1 main
 psql: FATAL: the database system is shutting down
 psql: FATAL: the database system is shutting down
 Use of uninitialized value $out in pattern match (m//) at /usr/share/postgresql-common/PgCommon.pm line 883.
 psql: FATAL: the database system is shutting down
 Use of uninitialized value $out in pattern match (m//) at /usr/share/postgresql-common/PgCommon.pm line 889.
 Use of uninitialized value $ctype in scalar chomp at /usr/share/postgresql-common/PgCommon.pm line 892.
 Use of uninitialized value $collate in scalar chomp at /usr/share/postgresql-common/PgCommon.pm line 893.
 Error: could not get cluster localesapt-get install postgresql-9.3

apt-get install postgresql-9.3 postgresql-common postgresql-client-9.3 postgresql-contrib-9.3 said, that all packages are in their newest version and

dpkg said:
iU postgresql 9.3+154 all object-relational SQL database (supported version)
ii postgresql-9.1 9.1.15-0ubuntu0.12.04 amd64 object-relational SQL database, version 9.1 server
iU postgresql-9.3 9.3.6-0ubuntu0.14.04 amd64 object-relational SQL database, version 9.3 server
iU postgresql-client 9.3+154 all front-end programs for PostgreSQL (supported version)
ii postgresql-client-9.1 9.1.15-0ubuntu0.12.04 amd64 front-end programs for PostgreSQL 9.1
iF postgresql-client-9.3 9.3.6-0ubuntu0.14.04 amd64 front-end programs for PostgreSQL 9.3
ii postgresql-client-common 154 all manager for multiple PostgreSQL client versions
ii postgresql-common 154 all PostgreSQL database-cluster manager
iU postgresql-contrib 9.3+154 all additional facilities for PostgreSQL (supported version)
ii postgresql-contrib-9.1 9.1.15-0ubuntu0.12.04 amd64 additional facilities for PostgreSQL
iU postgresql-contrib-9.3 9.3.6-0ubuntu0.14.04 amd64 additional facilities for PostgreSQL
ii postgresql-doc 9.3+154 all documentation for the PostgreSQL database management system
ii postgresql-doc-9.1 9.1.15-0ubuntu0.12.04 all documentation for the PostgreSQL database management system
ii postgresql-doc-9.3 9.3.6-0ubuntu0.14.04 all documentation for the PostgreSQL database management system

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Sorin Sbarnea (ssbarnea)]

Same bug happens when you try to upgrade the cluster from 9.3 to 9.4.

[Lenin (emaillenin)]

Same issue while upgrading from 9.4 to 9.5, how do we solve this?

[Steve Fox (drfickle2)]

FWIW, I'm also running into this, but found a work-around. It was suggested at http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.linux.debian.devel.bugs.general/1172657 to edit the pg_upgradecluster script and increase the timeout from 5 seconds to 30.

[Andrew B (n-launchpad-lineum-org)]

Hi,

In my instance this error originated deep down in the call stack in get_cluster_port in /usr/share/Perl5/Pgcommon.pm when attempting to upgrade from 9.3 to 9.5

In my postgresql.conf for the old 9.3 cluster I had the port line commented-out per the default configuration file:

#port = 5432

This worked fine in production since Postgres defaults to that port number when not defined. However its absence was causing get_cluster_port to fail and this was propagating up the call stack to get_encoding in pg_upgradecluster.

I decommented the port line:

port = 5432

and reran pg_upgradecluster with success.

[Rob Hills (rhills)]

This bug prevents me upgrading from 9.5 -> 9.6.

I tried both workarounds suggested above:
Edited /usr/bin/pg_upgradecluster changing lines 333 and 354 of that script from:
  push @argv, ('-t', '5') if $version >= '8.4';
to
  push @argv, ('-t', '30') if $version >= '8.4';
which was my guessed change based on comment #4 above: the posted link is broken.
I re-ran pg_upgradecluster but it crashed with the same error, and within less than a second of starting which suggests to me this isn't a timeout issue in my case.

Also checked my postgresql.conf file IAW comment #5 above, my port line was already uncommented.