Re: BUG #19483: pg_upgrade fails with orphan records in pg_init_priv catalog table

Hüseyin Demir <huseyin.d3r@gmail.com>

From: Hüseyin Demir <huseyin.d3r@gmail.com>
To: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
Cc: Greg Sabino Mullane <htamfids@gmail.com>, pgsql-bugs@lists.postgresql.org, Laurenz Albe <laurenz.albe@cybertec.at>
Date: 2026-06-12T16:22:03Z
Lists: pgsql-bugs

Attachments

Hi,

I worked on pg_dump and discussed it with Laurenz Albe. Created the
attached patch.

The fix filters dangling grantees out of each initprivs array at query
time, using NULLIF/ARRAY/NOT EXISTS against pg_authid. Entries for
grantee = 0 (PUBLIC) are never filtered. If all entries for an object
are dangling, NULL is returned and no ACL statement is emitted. Since
we cannot restore grants to non-existent roles. correct outcome,

The patch includes a TAP test (008_pg_dump_dangling_initprivs.pl) that
reproduces the scenario using allow_system_table_mods to create a
dangling pg_init_privs entry, then verifies pg_dump exits cleanly and
emits no invalid GRANT.

I have not prepared backpatch branches yet.

Regards.

Hüseyin Demir <huseyin.d3r@gmail.com>, 11 Haz 2026 Per, 07:49
tarihinde şunu yazdı:
>
> > The orphaned-rows problem shouldn't exist in v17 and later (see
> > 534287403, 35dd40d34, and related commits).  The OP is apparently
> > complaining about an upgrade from v14, where such rows could exist.
>
> Yes I was working on upgrading the PostgreSQL version from v14 to v18
> and was able to solve the problem by removing the danling records from
> pg_init_privs.
>
> > I wonder if it'd be sane for pg_dump to just skip dangling role
> > references in pg_init_privs.
>
> It will change the behavior of pg_dump and it's a general purpose tool
> because when we instruct pg_dump to filter orphan records it will
> change the content in the system catalogs.
>
> For now I suppose we have two options: either pg_upgrade or pg_dump.
>
> Regards.
>
>
> Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>, 7 Haz 2026 Paz, 17:52 tarihinde şunu yazdı:
> >
> > Greg Sabino Mullane <htamfids@gmail.com> writes:
> > >> 5. Verify orphan records remain in pg_init_privs:
> >
> > > Thanks for providing a failing use case. I ran this on a 18.3 server and
> > > found no orphaned rows - but I used the pg_stat_statements extension
> > > instead of pg_wait_sampling. Could you try your experiment using
> > > pg_stat_statements? And could you also show us the contents of the errant
> > > rows in pg_init_privs for the failing case?
> >
> > The orphaned-rows problem shouldn't exist in v17 and later (see
> > 534287403, 35dd40d34, and related commits).  The OP is apparently
> > complaining about an upgrade from v14, where such rows could exist.
> >
> > I don't especially care for the proposed fix of making pg_upgrade
> > refuse to run.  Manually correcting such situations would be tedious
> > and error-prone.  Plus, it's inconsistent with what we did about
> > related issues with role GRANTs (see 29d75b25b and 74b4438a7).
> > I wonder if it'd be sane for pg_dump to just skip dangling role
> > references in pg_init_privs.
> >
> >                         regards, tom lane