Forcibly Terminating a Session

Symptom

In some cases, the administrator must forcibly terminate abnormal sessions to keep the system healthy.

Procedure

1. Log in to the host as the OS user omm.

2. Run the following command to connect to the database:

   gsql -d mogdb -p 8000

   mogdb is the name of the database, and 8000 is the port number.

3. Find the thread ID of the faulty session from the current active session view.

   SELECT datid, pid, state, query FROM pg_stat_activity;

   A command output similar to the following is displayed, where the pid value indicates the thread ID of the session.

   datid |       pid       | state  | query
   -------+-----------------+--------+------
   13205 | 139834762094352 | active |
   13205 | 139834759993104 | idle   |
   (2 rows)

4. Terminate the session using its thread ID.

   SELECT pg_terminate_backend(139834762094352);

   If information similar to the following is displayed, the session is successfully terminated:

   pg_terminate_backend
   ---------------------
   t
   (1 row)

   If a command output similar to the following is displayed, a user is attempting to terminate the session, and the session will be reconnected rather than being terminated.

   FATAL:  terminating connection due to administrator command
   FATAL:  terminating connection due to administrator command The connection to the server was lost. Attempting reset: Succeeded.