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<title>Berkeley DB Reference Guide: Handling failure in Data Store and Concurrent Data Store applications</title>
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<td><b><dl><dt>Berkeley DB Reference Guide:<dd>Berkeley DB Concurrent Data Store Applications</dl></b></td>
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<p align=center><b>Handling failure in Data Store and Concurrent Data Store applications</b></p>
<p>When building Data Store and Concurrent Data Store applications, there
are design issues to consider whenever a thread of control with open
Berkeley DB handles fails for any reason (where a thread of control may be
either a true thread or a process).</p>
<p>The simplest case is handling system failure for any Data Store or
Concurrent Data Store application.  In the case of system failure, it
doesn't matter if the application has opened a database environment or
is just using standalone databases: if the system fails, after the
application has modified a database and has not subsequently flushed the
database to stable storage (by calling either the <a href="/api_c/db_close.html">DB-&gt;close</a>,
<a href="/api_c/db_sync.html">DB-&gt;sync</a> or <a href="/api_c/memp_sync.html">DB_ENV-&gt;memp_sync</a> methods), the database may be left in a
corrupted state.  In this case, before accessing the database again, the
database should either be:</p>
<p><ul type=disc>
<li>removed and re-created,
<li>removed and restored from the last known good backup, or
<li>verified using the <a href="/api_c/db_verify.html">DB-&gt;verify</a> method or <a href="/utility/db_verify.html">db_verify</a> utility.  If
the database does not verify cleanly, the contents may be salvaged using
the <b>-R</b> and <b>-r</b> options of the <a href="/utility/db_dump.html">db_dump</a>
utility.
</ul>
<p>Applications where the potential for data loss is unacceptable should
consider the Berkeley DB Transactional Data Store product, which offers standard transactional
durability guarantees, including recoverability after failure.</p>
<p>Additionally, system failure requires that any persistent database
environment (that is, any database environment not created using the
<a href="/api_c/env_open.html#DB_PRIVATE">DB_PRIVATE</a> flag), be removed.  Database environments may be
removed using the <a href="/api_c/env_remove.html">DB_ENV-&gt;remove</a> method.  If the persistent database
environment was backed by the filesystem (that is, the environment was
not created using the <a href="/api_c/env_open.html#DB_SYSTEM_MEM">DB_SYSTEM_MEM</a> flag), the database
environment may also be safely removed by deleting the environment's
files with standard system utilities.</p>
<p>The second case is application failure for a Data Store application,
with or without a database environment, or application failure for a
Concurrent Data Store application without a database environment: as in
the case of system failure, if any thread of control fails, after the
application has modified a database and has not subsequently flushed the
database to stable storage, the database may be left in a corrupted
state.  In this case, the database should be handled as described
previously in the system failure case.</p>
<p>The third case is application failure for a Concurrent Data Store
application with a database environment.  There are resources maintained
in database environments that may be left locked if a thread of control
exits without first closing all open Berkeley DB handles.  Concurrent Data
Store applications with database environments have an additional option
for handling the unexpected exit of a thread of control, the
<a href="/api_c/env_failchk.html">DB_ENV-&gt;failchk</a> method.</p>
<p>The <a href="/api_c/env_failchk.html">DB_ENV-&gt;failchk</a> method will return <a href="/ref/program/errorret.html#DB_RUNRECOVERY">DB_RUNRECOVERY</a> if the
database environment is unusable as a result of the thread of control
failure.  (If a data structure mutex or a database write lock is left
held by thread of control failure, the application should not continue
to use the database environment, as subsequent use of the environment
is likely to result in threads of control convoying behind the held
locks.)  The <a href="/api_c/env_failchk.html">DB_ENV-&gt;failchk</a> call will release any database read
locks that have been left held by the exit of a thread of control.  In
this case, the application can continue to use the database
environment.</p>
<p>A Concurrent Data Store application recovering from a thread of control
failure should call <a href="/api_c/env_failchk.html">DB_ENV-&gt;failchk</a>, and, if it returns success,
the application can continue.  If <a href="/api_c/env_failchk.html">DB_ENV-&gt;failchk</a> returns
<a href="/ref/program/errorret.html#DB_RUNRECOVERY">DB_RUNRECOVERY</a>, the application should proceed as described for
the case of system failure.</p>
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