Barman News - History of user-visible changes

Version 3.10.1 - 12 June 2024

- Bug fixes:
    - Make `argcomplete` optional to avoid installation issues on some
      platforms.
    - Load `barman.auto.conf` only when the file exists.
    - Emit a warning when the `cfg_changes.queue` file is malformed.
    - Correct in documentation the postgresql version where
      `pg_checkpoint` is available.
    - Add `--no-partial` option to `barman-cloud-wal-restore`.

Version 3.10.0 - 24 January 2024

- Limit the average bandwidth used by `barman-cloud-backup` when backing
  up to either AWS S3 or Azure Blob Storage according to the value set by
  a new CLI option `--max-bandwidth`.

- Add the new configuration option `lock_directory_cleanup`
  That enables cron to automatically clean up the barman_lock_directory
  from unused lock files.

- Add support for a new type of configuration called `model`. 
  The model acts as a set of overrides for configuration options
  for a given Barman server.

- Add a new barman command `barman config-update` that allows the creation
  and the update of configurations using JSON

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix a bug that caused `--min-chunk-size` to be ignored when using
      barman-cloud-backup as hook script in Barman.


Version 3.9.0 - 3 October 2023

- Allow `barman switch-wal --force` to be run against PG>=14 if the
  user has the `pg_checkpoint` role (thanks to toydarian for this patch).

- Log the current check at `info` level when a check timeout occurs.

- The minimum size of an upload chunk when using `barman-cloud-backup`
  with either S3 or Azure Blob Storage can now be specified using the
  `--min-chunk-size` option.

- `backup_compression = none` is supported when using `pg_basebackup`.

- For PostgreSQL 15 and later: the allowed `backup_compression_level`
  values for `zstd` and `lz4` have been updated to match those allowed by
  `pg_basebackup`.

- For PostgreSQL versions earlier than 15: `backup_compression_level = 0`
  can now be used with `backup_compression = gzip`.

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix `barman recover` on platforms where Multiprocessing uses spawn by
      default when starting new processes.

Version 3.8.0 - 31 August 2023

- Clarify package installation. barman is packaged with default python version
  for each operating system.

- The `minimum-redundancy` option is added to `barman-cloud-backup-delete`.
  It allows to set the minimum number of backups that should always be available.

- Add a new `primary_checkpoint_timeout` configuration option. Allows define
  the amount of seconds that Barman will wait at the end of a backup if no
  new WAL files are produced, before forcing a checkpoint on the primary server.

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix race condition in barman retention policies application. Backup
      deletions will now raise a warning if another deletion is in progress
      for the requested backup.

    - Fix `barman-cloud-backup-show` man page installation.

Version 3.7.0 - 25 July 2023

- Support is added for snapshot backups on AWS using EBS volumes.

- The `--profile` option in the `barman-cloud-*` scripts is renamed
  `--aws-profile`. The old name is deprecated and will be removed in
  a future release.

- Backup manifests can now be generated automatically on completion
  of a backup made with `backup_method = rsync`. This is enabled by
  setting the `autogenerate_manifest` configuration variable and can
  be overridden using the `--manifest` and `--no-manifest` CLI options.

- Bug fixes:

    - The `barman-cloud-*` scripts now correctly use continuation
      tokens to page through objects in AWS S3-compatible object
      stores. This fixes a bug where `barman-cloud-backup-delete`
      would only delete the oldest 1000 eligible WALs after backup
      deletion.

    - Minor documentation fixes.

Version 3.6.0 - 15 June 2023

- PostgreSQL version 10 is no longer supported.

- Support is added for snapshot backups on Microsoft Azure using
  Managed Disks.

- The `--snapshot-recovery-zone` option is renamed `--gcp-zone` for
  consistency with other provider-specific options. The old name
  is deprecated and will be removed in a future release.

- The `snapshot_zone` option and `--snapshot-zone` argument are
  renamed `gcp_zone` and `--gcp-zone` respectively. The old names
  are deprecated and will be removed in a future release.

- The `snapshot_gcp_project` option and `--snapshot-gcp-project`
  argument are renamed to `gcp_project` and `--gcp-project`. The
  old names are deprecated and will be removed in a future release.

- Bug fixes:

    - Barman will no longer attempt to execute the `replication-status`
      command for a passive node.

    - The `backup_label` is deleted from cloud storage when a
      snapshot backup is deleted with `barman-cloud-backup-delete`.

    - Man pages for the `generate-manifest` and `verify-backup`
      commands are added.

    - Minor documentation fixes.

Version 3.5.0 - 29 March 2023

- Python 2.7 is no longer supported. The earliest Python version
  supported is now 3.6.

- The `barman`, `barman-cli` and `barman-cli-cloud` packages for
  EL7 now require python 3.6 instead of python 2.7. For other
  supported platforms, Barman packages already require python
  versions 3.6 or later so packaging is unaffected.

- Support for PostgreSQL 10 will be discontinued in future Barman
  releases; 3.5.x is the last version of Barman with support for
  PostgreSQL 10.

- Backups and WALs uploaded to Google Cloud Storage can now be
  encrypted using a specific KMS key by using the `--kms-key-name`
  option with `barman-cloud-backup` or `barman-cloud-wal-archive`.

- Backups and WALs uploaded to AWS S3 can now be encrypted using a
  specific KMS key by using the `--sse-kms-key-id` option with
  `barman-cloud-backup` or `barman-cloud-wal-archive` along with
  `--encryption=aws:kms`.

- Two new configuration options are provided which make it possible
  to limit the rate at which parallel workers are started during
  backups with `backup_method = rsync` and recoveries.
  `parallel_jobs_start_batch_size` can be set to limit the amount of
  parallel workers which will be started in a single batch, and
  `parallel_jobs_start_batch_period` can be set to define the time
  in seconds over which a single batch of workers will be started.
  These can be overridden using the arguments `--jobs-start-batch-size`
  and `--jobs-start-batch-period` with the `barman backup` and
  `barman recover` commands.

- A new option `--recovery-conf-filename` is added to `barman recover`.
  This can be used to change the file to which Barman should write the
  PostgreSQL recovery options from the default `postgresql.auto.conf`
  to an alternative location.

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix a bug which prevented `barman-cloud-backup-show` from
      displaying the backup metadata for backups made with
      `barman backup` and uploaded by `barman-cloud-backup` as a
      post-backup hook script.

    - Fix a bug where the PostgreSQL connection used to validate backup
      compression settings was left open until termination of the
      Barman command.

    - Fix an issue which caused rsync-concurrent backups to fail when
      running for a duration greater than `idle_session_timeout`.

    - Fix a bug where the backup name was not saved in the backup
      metadata if the `--wait` flag was used with `barman backup`.

- Thanks to mojtabash78, mhkarimi1383, epolkerman, barthisrael and
  hzetters for their contributions.

Version 3.4.0 - 26 January 2023

- This is the last release of Barman which will support Python 2 and
  new features will henceforth require Python 3.6 or later.

- A new `backup_method` named `snapshot` is added. This will create
  backups by taking snapshots of cloud storage volumes. Currently
  only Google Cloud Platform is supported however support for AWS
  and Azure will follow in future Barman releases. Note that this
  feature requires a minimum Python version of 3.7. Please see the
  Barman manual for more information.

- Support for snapshot backups is also added to `barman-cloud-backup`,
  with minimal support for restoring a snapshot backup added to
  `barman-cloud-restore`.

- A new command `barman-cloud-backup-show` is added which displays
  backup metadata stored in cloud object storage and is analogous to
  `barman show-backup`. This is provided so that snapshot metadata
  can be easily retrieved at restore time however it is also a
  convenient way of inspecting metadata for any backup made with
  `barman-cloud-backup`.

- The instructions for installing Barman from RPMs in the docs are
  updated.

- The formatting of NFS requirements in the docs is fixed.

- Supported PostgreSQL versions are updated in the docs (this is a
  documentation fix only - the minimum supported major version is
  still 10).

Version 3.3.0 - 14 December 2022

- A backup can now be given a name at backup time using the new
  `--name` option supported by the `barman backup` and
  `barman-cloud-backup` commands. The backup name can then be used
  in place of the backup ID when running commands to interact with
  backups. Additionally, the commands to list and show backups have
  been been updated to include the backup name in the plain text and
  JSON output formats.

- Stricter checking of PostgreSQL version to verify that Barman is
  running against a supported version of PostgreSQL.

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix inconsistencies between the barman cloud command docs and
      the help output for those commands.

    - Use a new PostgreSQL connection when switching WALs on the
      primary during the backup of a standby to avoid undefined
      behaviour such as `SSL error` messages and failed connections.

    - Reduce log volume by changing the default log level of stdout
      for commands executed in child processes to `DEBUG` (with the
      exception of `pg_basebackup` which is deliberately logged at
      `INFO` level due to it being a long-running process where it is
      frequently useful to see the output during the execution of the
      command).

Version 3.2.0 - 20 October 2022

- `barman-cloud-backup-delete` now accepts a `--batch-size` option
  which determines the maximum number of objects deleted in a single
  request.

- All `barman-cloud-*` commands now accept a `--read-timeout` option
  which, when used with the `aws-s3` cloud provider, determines the
  read timeout used by the boto3 library when making requests to S3.

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix the failure of `barman recover` in cases where
      `backup_compression` is set in the Barman configuration but the
      PostgreSQL server is unavailable.

Version 3.1.0 - 14 September 2022

- Backups taken with `backup_method = postgres` can now be compressed
  using lz4 and zstd compression by setting `backup_compression = lz4`
  or `backup_compression = zstd` respectively. These options are only
  supported with PostgreSQL 15 (beta) or later.

- A new option `backup_compression_workers` is available which sets
  the number of threads used for parallel compression. This is
  currently only available with `backup_method = postgres` and
  `backup_compression = zstd`.

- A new option `primary_conninfo` can be set to avoid the need for
  backups of standbys to wait for a WAL switch to occur on the primary
  when finalizing the backup. Barman will use the connection string
  in `primary_conninfo` to perform WAL switches on the primary when
  stopping the backup.

- Support for certain Rsync versions patched for CVE-2022-29154 which
  require a trailing newline in the `--files-from` argument.

- Allow `barman receive-wal` maintenance options (`--stop`, `--reset`,
  `--drop-slot` and `--create-slot`) to run against inactive servers.

- Add `--port` option to `barman-wal-archive` and `barman-wal-restore`
  commands so that a custom SSH port can be used without requiring any
  SSH configuration.

- Various documentation improvements.

- Python 3.5 is no longer supported.

- Bug fixes:

    - Ensure PostgreSQL connections are closed cleanly during the
      execution of `barman cron`.

    - `barman generate-manifest` now treats pre-existing
      backup_manifest files as an error condition.

    - backup_manifest files are renamed by appending the backup ID
      during recovery operations to prevent future backups including
      an old backup_manifest file.

    - Fix epoch timestamps in json output which were not
      timezone-aware.

    - The output of `pg_basebackup` is now written to the Barman
      log file while the backup is in progress.

- We thank barthisrael, elhananjair, kraynopp, lucianobotti, and mxey
  for their contributions to this release.

Version 3.0.1 - 27 June 2022

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix package signing issue in PyPI (same sources as 3.0.0)

Version 3.0.0 - 23 June 2022

- BREAKING CHANGE: PostgreSQL versions 9.6 and earlier are no longer
  supported. If you are using one of these versions you will need to
  use an earlier version of Barman.

- BREAKING CHANGE: The default backup mode for Rsync backups is now
  concurrent rather than exclusive. Exclusive backups have been
  deprecated since PostgreSQL 9.6 and have been removed in PostgreSQL
  15. If you are running Barman against PostgreSQL versions earlier
  than 15 and want to use exclusive backups you will now need to set
  `exclusive_backup` in `backup_options`.

- BREAKING CHANGE: The backup metadata stored in the `backup.info` file
  for each backup has an extra field. This means that earlier versions
  of Barman will not work in the presence of any backups taken with
  3.0.0. Additionally, users of pg-backup-api will need to upgrade it
  to version 0.2.0 so that pg-backup-api can work with the updated
  metadata.

- Backups taken with `backup_method = postgres` can now be compressed
  by pg_basebackup by setting the `backup_compression` config option.
  Additional options are provided to control the compression level,
  the backup format and whether the pg_basebackup client or the
  PostgreSQL server applies the compression. NOTE: Recovery of these
  backups requires Barman to stage the compressed files on the recovery
  server in a location specified by the `recovery_staging_path` option.

- Add support for PostgreSQL 15. Exclusive backups are not supported
  by PostgreSQL 15 therefore Barman configurations for PostgreSQL 15
  servers are not allowed to specify `exclusive_backup` in
  `backup_options`.

- Various documentation improvements.

- Use custom_compression_magic, if set, when identifying compressed
  WAL files. This allows Barman to correctly identify uncompressed
  WALs (such as `*.partial` files in the `streaming` directory) and
  return them instead of attempting to decompress them.

- Bug fixes:

    - Fix an ordering bug which caused Barman to log the message
      "Backup failed issuing start backup command." while handling a
      failure in the stop backup command.

    - Fix a bug which prevented recovery using `--target-tli` when
      timelines greater than 9 were present, due to hexadecimal values
      from WAL segment names being parsed as base 10 integers.

    - Fix an import error which occurs when using barman cloud with
      certain python2 installations due to issues with the enum34
      dependency.

    - Fix a bug where Barman would not read more than three bytes from
      a compressed WAL when attempting to identify the magic bytes. This
      means that any custom compressed WALs using magic longer than three
      bytes are now decompressed correctly.

    - Fix a bug which caused the `--immediate-checkpoint` flag to be
      ignored during backups with `backup_method = rsync`.

Version 2.19 - 9 March 2022

- Change `barman diagnose` output date format to ISO8601.

- Add Google Cloud Storage (GCS) support to barman cloud.

- Support `current` and `latest` recovery targets for the `--target-tli`
  option of `barman recover`.

- Add documentation for installation on SLES.

- Bug fixes:

    - `barman-wal-archive --test` now returns a non-zero exit code when
      an error occurs.

    - Fix `barman-cloud-check-wal-archive` behaviour when `-t` option is
      used so that it exits after connectivity test.

    - `barman recover` now continues when `--no-get-wal` is used and
       `"get-wal"` is not set in `recovery_options`.

    - Fix `barman show-servers --format=json ${server}` output for
      inactive server.

    - Check for presence of `barman_home` in configuration file.

    - Passive barman servers will no longer store two copies of the
      tablespace data when syncing backups taken with
      `backup_method = postgres`.

- We thank richyen for his contributions to this release.

Version 2.18 - 21 January 2022

- Add snappy compression algorithm support in barman cloud (requires the
  optional python-snappy dependency).

- Allow Azure client concurrency parameters to be set when uploading
  WALs with barman-cloud-wal-archive.

- Add `--tags` option in barman cloud so that backup files and archived
  WALs can be tagged in cloud storage (aws and azure).

- Update the barman cloud exit status codes so that there is a dedicated
  code (2) for connectivity errors.

- Add the commands `barman verify-backup` and `barman generate-manifest`
  to check if a backup is valid.

- Add support for Azure Managed Identity auth in barman cloud which can
  be enabled with the `--credential` option.

- Bug fixes:

    - Change `barman-cloud-check-wal-archive` behavior when bucket does
      not exist.

    - Ensure `list-files` output is always sorted regardless of the
      underlying filesystem.

    - Man pages for barman-cloud-backup-keep, barman-cloud-backup-delete
      and barman-cloud-check-wal-archive added to Python packaging.

- We thank richyen and stratakis for their contributions to this
  release.

Version 2.17 - 1 December 2021

- Bug fixes:

    - Resolves a performance regression introduced in version 2.14 which
      increased copy times for `barman backup` or `barman recover` commands
      when using the `--jobs` flag.

    - Ignore rsync partial transfer errors for `sender` processes so that
      such errors do not cause the backup to fail (thanks to barthisrael).

Version 2.16 - 17 November 2021 

- Add the commands `barman-check-wal-archive` and `barman-cloud-check-wal-archive`
  to validate if a proposed archive location is safe to use for a new PostgreSQL 
  server. 

- Allow Barman to identify WAL that's already compressed using a custom
  compression scheme to avoid compressing it again.

- Add `last_backup_minimum_size` and `last_wal_maximum_age` options to 
  `barman check`.

- Bug fixes:

    - Use argparse for command line parsing instead of the unmaintained
      argh module.

    - Make timezones consistent for `begin_time` and `end_time`.

- We thank chtitux, George Hansper, stratakis, Thoro, and vrms for their
  contributions to this release.

Version 2.15 - 12 October 2021

- Add plural forms for the `list-backup`, `list-server` and
  `show-server` commands which are now `list-backups`, `list-servers`
  and `show-servers`. The singular forms are retained for backward
  compatibility.

- Add the `last-failed` backup shortcut which references the newest
  failed backup in the catalog so that you can do:

    - `barman delete <SERVER> last-failed`

- Bug fixes:

    - Tablespaces will no longer be omitted from backups of EPAS
      versions 9.6 and 10 due to an issue detecting the correct version
      string on older versions of EPAS.

Version 2.14 - 22 September 2021

- Add the `barman-cloud-backup-delete` command which allows backups in
  cloud storage to be deleted by specifying either a backup ID or a
  retention policy.

- Allow backups to be retained beyond any retention policies in force by
  introducing the ability to tag existing backups as archival backups
  using `barman keep` and `barman-cloud-backup-keep`.

- Allow the use of SAS authentication tokens created at the restricted
  blob container level (instead of the wider storage account level) for
  Azure blob storage

- Significantly speed up `barman restore` into an empty directory for
  backups that contain hundreds of thousands of files.

- Bug fixes:

    - The backup privileges check will no longer fail if the user lacks
      "userepl" permissions and will return better error messages if any
      required permissions are missing (#318 and #319).

Version 2.13 - 26 July 2021

- Add Azure blob storage support to barman-cloud

- Support tablespace remapping in barman-cloud-restore via
  `--tablespace name:location`

- Allow barman-cloud-backup and barman-cloud-wal-archive to run as
  Barman hook scripts, to allow data to be relayed to cloud storage
  from the Barman server

- Bug fixes:

    - Stop backups failing due to idle_in_transaction_session_timeout
      (https://github.com/EnterpriseDB/barman/issues/333)

    - Fix a race condition between backup and archive-wal in updating
      xlog.db entries (#328)

    - Handle PGDATA being a symlink in barman-cloud-backup, which led to
      "seeking backwards is not allowed" errors on restore (#351)

    - Recreate pg_wal on restore if the original was a symlink (#327)

    - Recreate pg_tblspc symlinks for tablespaces on restore (#343)

    - Make barman-cloud-backup-list skip backups it cannot read, e.g.,
      because they are in Glacier storage (#332)

    - Add `-d database` option to barman-cloud-backup to specify which
      database to connect to initially (#307)

    - Fix "Backup failed uploading data" errors from barman-cloud-backup
      on Python 3.8 and above, caused by attempting to pickle the boto3
      client (#361)

    - Correctly enable server-side encryption in S3 for buckets that do
      not have encryption enabled by default.

      In Barman 2.12, barman-cloud-backup's `--encryption` option did
      not correctly enable encryption for the contents of the backup if
      the backup was stored in an S3 bucket that did not have encryption
      enabled. If this is the case for you, please consider deleting
      your old backups and taking new backups with Barman 2.13.

      If your S3 buckets already have encryption enabled by default
      (which we recommend), this does not affect you.

Version 2.12.1 - 30 June 2021

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Allow specifying target-tli with other target-* recovery options
    -   Fix incorrect NAME in barman-cloud-backup-list manpage
    -   Don't raise an error if SIGALRM is ignored
    -   Fetch wal_keep_size, not wal_keep_segments, from Postgres 13

Version 2.12 - 5 Nov 2020

-   Introduce a new backup_method option called local-rsync which
    targets those cases where Barman is installed on the same server
    where PostgreSQL is and directly uses rsync to take base backups,
    bypassing the SSH layer.

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Avoid corrupting boto connection in worker processes
    -   Avoid connection attempts to PostgreSQL during tests

Version 2.11 - 9 Jul 2020

-   Introduction of the barman-cli-cloud package that contains all cloud
    related utilities.

-   Add barman-cloud-wal-restore to restore a WAL file previously
    archived with barman-cloud-wal-archive from an object store

-   Add barman-cloud-restore to restore a backup previously taken with
    barman-cloud-backup from an object store

-   Add barman-cloud-backup-list to list backups taken with
    barman-cloud-backup in an object store

-   Add support for arbitrary archive size for barman-cloud-backup

-   Add support for --endpoint-url option to cloud utilities

-   Remove strict superuser requirement for PG 10+ (by Kaarel Moppel)

-   Add --log-level runtime option for barman to override default log
    level for a specific command

-   Support for PostgreSQL 13

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Suppress messages and warning with SSH connections in barman-cli
        (GH-257)
    -   Fix a race condition when retrieving uploaded parts in
        barman-cloud-backup (GH-259)
    -   Close the PostgreSQL connection after a backup (GH-258)
    -   Check for uninitialized replication slots in receive-wal --reset
        (GH-260)
    -   Ensure that begin_wal is valorised before acting on it (GH-262)
    -   Fix bug in XLOG/WAL arithmetic with custom segment size (GH-287)
    -   Fix rsync compatibility error with recent rsync
    -   Fix PostgreSQLClient version parsing
    -   Fix PostgreSQL exception handling with non ASCII messages
    -   Ensure each postgres connection has an empty search_path
    -   Avoid connecting to PostgreSQL while reading a backup.info file

If you are using already barman-cloud-wal-archive or barman-cloud-backup
installed via RPM/Apt package and you are upgrading your system, you
must install the barman-cli-cloud package. All cloud related tools are
now part of the barman-cli-cloud package, including
barman-cloud-wal-archive and barman-cloud-backup that were previously
shipped with barman-cli. The reason is complex dependency management of
the boto3 library, which is a requirement for the cloud utilities.

Version 2.10 - 5 Dec 2019

-   Pull .partial WAL files with get-wal and barman-wal-restore,
    allowing restore_command in a recovery scenario to fetch a partial
    WAL file's content from the Barman server. This feature simplifies
    and enhances RPO=0 recovery operations.

-   Store the PostgreSQL system identifier in the server directory and
    inside the backup information file. Improve check command to verify
    the consistency of the system identifier with active connections
    (standard and replication) and data on disk.

-   A new script called barman-cloud-wal-archive has been added to the
    barman-cli package to directly ship WAL files from PostgreSQL (using
    archive_command) to cloud object storage services that are
    compatible with AWS S3. It supports encryption and compression.

-   A new script called barman-cloud-backup has been added to the
    barman-cli package to directly ship base backups from a local
    PostgreSQL server to cloud object storage services that are
    compatible with AWS S3. It supports encryption, parallel upload,
    compression.

-   Automated creation of replication slots through the server/global
    option create_slot. When set to auto, Barman creates the replication
    slot, in case streaming_archiver is enabled and slot_name is
    defined. The default value is manual for back-compatibility.

-   Add '-w/--wait' option to backup command, making Barman wait for all
    required WAL files to be archived before considering the backup
    completed. Add also the --wait-timeout option (default 0, no
    timeout).

-   Redact passwords from Barman output, in particular from
    barman diagnose (InfoSec)

-   Improve robustness of receive-wal --reset command, by verifying that
    the last partial file is aligned with the current location or, if
    present, with replication slot's.

-   Documentation improvements

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Wrong string matching operation when excluding tablespaces
        inside PGDATA (GH-245)
    -   Minor fixes in WAL delete hook scripts (GH-240)
    -   Fix PostgreSQL connection aliveness check (GH-239)

Version 2.9 - 1 Aug 2019

-   Transparently support PostgreSQL 12, by supporting the new way of
    managing recovery and standby settings through GUC options and
    signal files (recovery.signal and standby.signal)

-   Add --bwlimit command line option to set bandwidth limitation for
    backup and recover commands

-   Ignore WAL archive failure for check command in case the latest
    backup is WAITING_FOR_WALS

-   Add --target-lsn option to set recovery target Log Sequence Number
    for recover command with PostgreSQL 10 or higher

-   Add --spool-dir option to barman-wal-restore so that users can
    change the spool directory location from the default, avoiding
    conflicts in case of multiple PostgreSQL instances on the same
    server (thanks to Drazen Kacar).

-   Rename barman_xlog directory to barman_wal

-   JSON output writer to export command output as JSON objects and
    facilitate integration with external tools and systems (thanks to
    Marcin Onufry Hlybin). Experimental in this release.

Bug fixes:

-   replication-status doesn’t show streamers with no slot (GH-222)

-   When checking that a connection is alive (“SELECT 1” query),
    preserve the status of the PostgreSQL connection (GH-149). This
    fixes those cases of connections that were terminated due to
    idle-in-transaction timeout, causing concurrent backups to fail.

Version 2.8 - 17 May 2019

-   Add support for reuse_backup in geo-redundancy for incremental
    backup copy in passive nodes

-   Improve performance of rsync based copy by using strptime instead of
    the more generic dateutil.parser (#210)

-   Add ‘--test’ option to barman-wal-archive and barman-wal-restore to
    verify the connection with the Barman server

-   Complain if backup_options is not explicitly set, as the future
    default value will change from exclusive_backup to concurrent_backup
    when PostgreSQL 9.5 will be declared EOL by the PGDG

-   Display additional settings in the show-server and diagnose
    commands: archive_timeout, data_checksums, hot_standby,
    max_wal_senders, max_replication_slots and wal_compression.

-   Merge the barman-cli project in Barman

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Fix encoding error in get-wal on Python 3 (Jeff Janes, #221)
    -   Fix exclude_and_protect_filter (Jeff Janes, #217)
    -   Remove spurious message when resetting WAL (Jeff Janes, #215)
    -   Fix sync-wals error if primary has WALs older than the first
        backup
    -   Support for double quotes in synchronous_standby_names setting

-   Minor changes:

    -   Improve messaging of check --nagios for inactive servers
    -   Log remote SSH command with recover command
    -   Hide logical decoding connections in replication-status command

This release officially supports Python 3 and deprecates Python 2 (which
might be discontinued in future releases).

PostgreSQL 9.3 and older is deprecated from this release of Barman.
Support for backup from standby is now limited to PostgreSQL 9.4 or
higher and to WAL shipping from the standby (please refer to the
documentation for details).

Version 2.7 - 21 Mar 2019

-   Fix error handling during the parallel backup. Previously an
    unrecoverable error during the copy could have corrupted the barman
    internal state, requiring a manual kill of barman process with
    SIGTERM and a manual cleanup of the running backup in PostgreSQL.
    (GH#199)

-   Fix support of UTF-8 characters in input and output (GH#194 and
    GH#196)

-   Ignore history/backup/partial files for first sync of geo-redundancy
    (GH#198)

-   Fix network failure with geo-redundancy causing cron to break
    (GH#202)

-   Fix backup validation in PostgreSQL older than 9.2

-   Various documentation fixes

Version 2.6 - 4 Feb 2019

-   Add support for Geographical redundancy, introducing 3 new commands:
    sync-info, sync-backup and sync-wals. Geo-redundancy allows a Barman
    server to use another Barman server as data source instead of a
    PostgreSQL server.

-   Add put-wal command that allows Barman to safely receive WAL files
    via PostgreSQL's archive_command using the barman-wal-archive script
    included in barman-cli

-   Add ANSI colour support to check command

-   Minor fixes:

    -   Fix switch-wal on standby with an empty WAL directory
    -   Honour archiver locking in wait_for_wal method
    -   Fix WAL compression detection algorithm
    -   Fix current_action in concurrent stop backup errors
    -   Do not treat lock file busy as an error when validating a backup

Version 2.5 - 23 Oct 2018

-   Add support for PostgreSQL 11

-   Add check-backup command to verify that WAL files required for
    consistency of a base backup are present in the archive. Barman now
    adds a new state (WAITING_FOR_WALS) after completing a base backup,
    and sets it to DONE once it has verified that all WAL files from
    start to the end of the backup exist. This command is included in
    the regular cron maintenance job. Barman now notifies users
    attempting to recover a backup that is in WAITING_FOR_WALS state.

-   Allow switch-xlog --archive to work on a standby (just for the
    archive part)

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Fix decoding errors reading external commands output (issue
        #174)

    -   Fix documentation regarding WAL streaming and backup from
        standby

Version 2.4 - 25 May 2018

-   Add standard and retry hook scripts for backup deletion (pre/post)

-   Add standard and retry hook scripts for recovery (pre/post)

-   Add standard and retry hook scripts for WAL deletion (pre/post)

-   Add --standby-mode option to barman recover to add standby_mode = on
    in pre-generated recovery.conf

-   Add --target-action option to barman recover, allowing users to add
    shutdown, pause or promote to the pre-generated recovery.conf file

-   Improve usability of point-in-time recovery with consistency checks
    (e.g. recovery time is after end time of backup)

-   Minor documentation improvements

-   Drop support for Python 3.3

Relevant bug fixes:

-   Fix remote get_file_content method (GitHub #151), preventing
    incremental recovery from happening

-   Unicode issues with command (GitHub #143 and #150)

-   Add --wal-method=none when pg_basebackup >= 10 (GitHub #133)

Minor bug fixes:

-   Stop process manager module from overwriting lock files content

-   Relax the rules for rsync output parsing

-   Ignore vanished files in streaming directory

-   Case insensitive slot names (GitHub #170)

-   Make DataTransferFailure.from_command_error() more resilient
    (GitHub #86)

-   Rename command() to barman_command() (GitHub #118)

-   Initialise synchronous standby names list if not set (GitHub #111)

-   Correct placeholders ordering (GitHub #138)

-   Force datestyle to iso for replication connections

-   Returns error if delete command does not remove the backup

-   Fix exception when calling is_power_of_two(None)

-   Downgraded sync standby names messages to debug (GitHub #89)

Version 2.3 - 5 Sep 2017

-   Add support to PostgreSQL 10

-   Follow naming changes in PostgreSQL 10:

    -   The switch-xlog command has been renamed to switch-wal.
    -   In commands output, the xlog word has been changed to WAL and
        location has been changed to LSN when appropriate.

-   Add the --network-compression/--no-network-compression options to
    barman recover to enable or disable network compression at run-time

-   Add --target-immediate option to recover command, in order to exit
    recovery when a consistent state is reached (end of the backup,
    available from PostgreSQL 9.4)

-   Show cluster state (master or standby) with barman status command

-   Documentation improvements

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Fix high memory usage with parallel_jobs > 1 (#116)
    -   Better handling of errors using parallel copy (#114)
    -   Make barman diagnose more robust with system exceptions
    -   Let archive-wal ignore files with .tmp extension

Version 2.2 - 17 Jul 2017

-   Implement parallel copy for backup/recovery through the
    parallel_jobs global/server option to be overridden by the --jobs or
    -j runtime option for the backup and recover command. Parallel
    backup is available only for the rsync copy method. By default, it
    is set to 1 (for behaviour compatibility with previous versions).

-   Support custom WAL size for PostgreSQL 8.4 and newer. At backup
    time, Barman retrieves from PostgreSQL wal_segment_size and
    wal_block_size values and computes the necessary calculations.

-   Improve check command to ensure that incoming directory is empty
    when archiver=off, and streaming directory is empty when
    streaming_archiver=off (#80).

-   Add external_configuration to backup_options so that users can
    instruct Barman to ignore backup of configuration files when they
    are not inside PGDATA (default for Debian/Ubuntu installations). In
    this case, Barman does not display a warning anymore.

-   Add --get-wal and --no-get-wal options to barman recover

-   Add max_incoming_wals_queue global/server option for the check
    command so that a non blocking error is returned in case incoming
    WAL directories for both archiver and the streaming_archiver contain
    more files than the specified value.

-   Documentation improvements

-   File format changes:

    -   The format of backup.info file has changed. For this reason a
        backup taken with Barman 2.2 cannot be read by a previous
        version of Barman. But, backups taken by previous versions can
        be read by Barman 2.2.

-   Minor bug fixes:

    -   Allow replication-status to work against a standby
    -   Close any PostgreSQL connection before starting pg_basebackup
        (#104, #108)
    -   Safely handle paths containing special characters
    -   Archive .partial files after promotion of streaming source
    -   Recursively create directories during recovery (SF#44)
    -   Improve xlog.db locking (#99)
    -   Remove tablespace_map file during recover (#95)
    -   Reconnect to PostgreSQL if connection drops (SF#82)

Version 2.1 - 5 Jan 2017

-   Add --archive and --archive-timeout options to switch-xlog command

-   Preliminary support for PostgreSQL 10 (#73)

-   Minor additions:

    -   Add last archived WAL info to diagnose output
    -   Add start time and execution time to the output of delete
        command

-   Minor bug fixes:

    -   Return failure for get-wal command on inactive server
    -   Make streaming_archiver_names and streaming_backup_name options
        global (#57)
    -   Fix rsync failures due to files truncated during transfer (#64)
    -   Correctly handle compressed history files (#66)
    -   Avoid de-referencing symlinks in pg_tblspc when preparing
        recovery (#55)
    -   Fix comparison of last archiving failure (#40, #58)
    -   Avoid failing recovery if postgresql.conf is not writable (#68)
    -   Fix output of replication-status command (#56)
    -   Exclude files from backups like pg_basebackup (#65, #72)
    -   Exclude directories from other Postgres versions while copying
        tablespaces (#74)
    -   Make retry hook script options global

Version 2.0 - 27 Sep 2016

-   Support for pg_basebackup and base backups over the PostgreSQL
    streaming replication protocol with backup_method=postgres
    (PostgreSQL 9.1 or higher required)

-   Support for physical replication slots through the slot_name
    configuration option as well as the --create-slot and --drop-slot
    options for the receive-wal command (PostgreSQL 9.4 or higher
    required). When slot_name is specified and streaming_archiver is
    enabled, receive-wal transparently integrates with pg_receivexlog,
    and check makes sure that slots exist and are actively used

-   Support for the new backup API introduced in PostgreSQL 9.6, which
    transparently enables concurrent backups and backups from standby
    servers using the standard rsync method of backup. Concurrent backup
    was only possible for PostgreSQL 9.2 to 9.5 versions through the
    pgespresso extension. The new backup API will make pgespresso
    redundant in the future

-   If properly configured, Barman can function as a synchronous standby
    in terms of WAL streaming. By properly setting the
    streaming_archiver_name in the synchronous_standby_names priority
    list on the master, and enabling replication slot support, the
    receive-wal command can now be part of a PostgreSQL synchronous
    replication cluster, bringing RPO=0 (PostgreSQL 9.5.5 or
    higher required)

-   Introduce barman-wal-restore, a standard and robust script written
    in Python that can be used as restore_command in recovery.conf files
    of any standby server of a cluster. It supports remote parallel
    fetching of WAL files by efficiently invoking get-wal through SSH.
    Currently available as a separate project called barman-cli. The
    barman-cli package is required for remote recovery when get-wal is
    listed in recovery_options

-   Control the maximum execution time of the check command through the
    check_timeout global/server configuration option (30 seconds
    by default)

-   Limit the number of WAL segments that are processed by an
    archive-wal run, through the archiver_batch_size and
    streaming_archiver_batch_size global/server options which control
    archiving of WAL segments coming from, respectively, the standard
    archiver and receive-wal

-   Removed locking of the XLOG database during check operations

-   The show-backup command is now aware of timelines and properly
    displays which timelines can be used as recovery targets for a given
    base backup. Internally, Barman is now capable of parsing .history
    files

-   Improved the logic behind the retry mechanism when copy operations
    experience problems. This involves backup (rsync and postgres) as
    well as remote recovery (rsync)

-   Code refactoring involving remote command and physical copy
    interfaces

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Correctly handle .history files from streaming
    -   Fix replication-status on PostgreSQL 9.1
    -   Fix replication-status when sent and write locations are not
        available
    -   Fix misleading message on pg_receivexlog termination

Version 1.6.1 - 23 May 2016

-   Add --peek option to get-wal command to discover existing WAL files
    from the Barman's archive

-   Add replication-status command for monitoring the status of any
    streaming replication clients connected to the PostgreSQL server.
    The --target option allows users to limit the request to only hot
    standby servers or WAL streaming clients

-   Add the switch-xlog command to request a switch of a WAL file to the
    PostgreSQL server. Through the '--force' it issues a CHECKPOINT
    beforehand

-   Add streaming_archiver_name option, which sets a proper
    application_name to pg_receivexlog when streaming_archiver is
    enabled (only for PostgreSQL 9.3 and above)

-   Check for _superuser_ privileges with PostgreSQL's standard
    connections (#30)

-   Check the WAL archive is never empty

-   Check for 'backup_label' on the master when server is down

-   Improve barman-wal-restore contrib script

-   Bug fixes:

    -   Treat the "failed backups" check as non-fatal
    -   Rename '-x' option for get-wal as '-z'
    -   Add archive_mode=always support for PostgreSQL 9.5 (#32)
    -   Properly close PostgreSQL connections when necessary
    -   Fix receive-wal for pg_receive_xlog version 9.2

Version 1.6.0 - 29 Feb 2016

-   Support for streaming replication connection through the
    streaming_conninfo server option

-   Support for the streaming_archiver option that allows Barman to
    receive WAL files through PostgreSQL's native streaming protocol.
    When set to 'on', it relies on pg_receivexlog to receive WAL data,
    reducing Recovery Point Objective. Currently, WAL streaming is an
    additional feature (standard log archiving is still required)

-   Implement the receive-wal command that, when streaming_archiver is
    on, wraps pg_receivexlog for WAL streaming. Add --stop option to
    stop receiving WAL files via streaming protocol. Add --reset option
    to reset the streaming status and restart from the current xlog
    in Postgres.

-   Automatic management (startup and stop) of receive-wal command via
    cron command

-   Support for the path_prefix configuration option

-   Introduction of the archiver option (currently fixed to on) which
    enables continuous WAL archiving for a specific server, through log
    shipping via PostgreSQL's archive_command

-   Support for streaming_wals_directory and errors_directory options

-   Management of WAL duplicates in archive-wal command and integration
    with check command

-   Verify if pg_receivexlog is running in check command when
    streaming_archiver is enabled

-   Verify if failed backups are present in check command

-   Accept compressed WAL files in incoming directory

-   Add support for the pigz compressor (thanks to Stefano Zacchiroli
    zack@upsilon.cc)

-   Implement pygzip and pybzip2 compressors (based on an initial idea
    of Christoph Moench-Tegeder christoph@2ndquadrant.de)

-   Creation of an implicit restore point at the end of a backup

-   Current size of the PostgreSQL data files in barman status

-   Permit archive_mode=always for PostgreSQL 9.5 servers (thanks to
    Christoph Moench-Tegeder christoph@2ndquadrant.de)

-   Complete refactoring of the code responsible for connecting to
    PostgreSQL

-   Improve messaging of cron command regarding sub-processes

-   Native support for Python >= 3.3

-   Changes of behaviour:
    -   Stop trashing WAL files during archive-wal (commit:e3a1d16)

-   Bug fixes:
    -   Atomic WAL file archiving (#9 and #12)
    -   Propagate "-c" option to any Barman subprocess (#19)
    -   Fix management of backup ID during backup deletion (#22)
    -   Improve archive-wal robustness and log messages (#24)
    -   Improve error handling in case of missing parameters

Version 1.5.1 - 16 Nov 2015

-   Add support for the 'archive-wal' command which performs WAL
    maintenance operations on a given server
-   Add support for "per-server" concurrency of the 'cron' command
-   Improved management of xlog.db errors
-   Add support for mixed compression types in WAL files (SF.net#61)
-   Bug fixes:
    -   Avoid retention policy checks during the recovery
    -   Avoid 'wal_level' check on PostgreSQL version < 9.0 (#3)
    -   Fix backup size calculation (#5)

Version 1.5.0 - 28 Sep 2015

-   Add support for the get-wal command which allows users to fetch any
    WAL file from the archive of a specific server
-   Add support for retry hook scripts, a special kind of hook scripts
    that Barman tries to run until they succeed
-   Add active configuration option for a server to temporarily disable
    the server by setting it to False
-   Add barman_lock_directory global option to change the location of
    lock files (by default: 'barman_home')
-   Execute the full suite of checks before starting a backup, and skip
    it in case one or more checks fail
-   Forbid to delete a running backup
-   Analyse include directives of a PostgreSQL server during backup and
    recover operations
-   Add check for conflicting paths in the configuration of Barman, both
    intra (by temporarily disabling a server) and inter-server (by
    refusing any command, to any server).
-   Add check for wal_level
-   Add barman-wal-restore script to be used as restore_command on a
    standby server, in conjunction with barman get-wal
-   Implement a standard and consistent policy for error management
-   Improved cache management of backups
-   Improved management of configuration in unit tests
-   Tutorial and man page sources have been converted to Markdown format
-   Add code documentation through Sphinx
-   Complete refactor of the code responsible for managing the backup
    and the recover commands
-   Changed internal directory structure of a backup
-   Introduce copy_method option (currently fixed to rsync)
-   Bug fixes:
    -   Manage options without '=' in PostgreSQL configuration files
    -   Preserve Timeline history files (Fixes: #70)
    -   Workaround for rsync on SUSE Linux (Closes: #13 and #26)
    -   Disables dangerous settings in postgresql.auto.conf
        (Closes: #68)

Version 1.4.1 - 05 May 2015

* Fix for WAL archival stop working if first backup is EMPTY
  (Closes: #64)
* Fix exception during error handling in Barman recovery
  (Closes: #65)
* After a backup, limit cron activity to WAL archiving only
  (Closes: #62)
* Improved robustness and error reporting of the backup delete
  command (Closes: #63)
* Fix computation of WAL production ratio as reported in the
  show-backup command
* Improved management of xlogdb file, which is now correctly fsynced
  when updated. Also, the rebuild-xlogdb command now operates on a
  temporary new file, which overwrites the main one when finished.
* Add unit tests for dateutil module compatibility
* Modified Barman version following PEP 440 rules and added support
  of tests in Python 3.4

Version 1.4.0 - 26 Jan 2015

* Incremental base backup implementation through the reuse_backup
  global/server option. Possible values are off (disabled,
  default), copy (preventing unmodified files from being
  transferred) and link (allowing for deduplication through hard
  links).
* Store and show deduplication effects when using reuse_backup=
  link.
* Added transparent support of pg_stat_archiver (PostgreSQL 9.4) in
  check, show-server and status commands.
* Improved administration by invoking WAL maintenance at the end of
  a successful backup.
* Changed the way unused WAL files are trashed, by differentiating
  between concurrent and exclusive backup cases.
* Improved performance of WAL statistics calculation.
* Treat a missing pg_ident.conf as a WARNING rather than an error.
* Refactored output layer by removing remaining yield calls.
* Check that rsync is in the system path.
* Include history files in WAL management.
* Improved robustness through more unit tests.
* Fixed bug #55: Ignore fsync EINVAL errors on directories.
* Fixed bug #58: retention policies delete.

Version 1.3.3 - 21 Aug 2014

* Added "last_backup_max_age", a new global/server option that
  allows administrators to set the max age of the last backup in a
  catalogue, making it easier to detect any issues with periodical
  backup execution
* Improved robustness of "barman backup" by introducing two global/
  server options: "basebackup_retry_times" and
  "basebackup_retry_sleep". These options allow an administrator to
  specify, respectively, the number of attempts for a copy
  operation after a failure, and the number of seconds of wait
  before retrying
* Improved the recovery process via rsync on an existing directory
  (incremental recovery), by splitting the previous rsync call into
  several ones - invoking checksum control only when necessary
* Added support for PostgreSQL 8.3
* Minor changes:

    + Support for comma separated list values configuration options
    + Improved backup durability by calling fsync() on backup and
      WAL files during "barman backup" and "barman cron"
    + Improved Nagios output for "barman check --nagios"
    + Display compression ratio for WALs in "barman show-backup"
    + Correctly handled keyboard interruption (CTRL-C) while
      performing barman backup
    + Improved error messages of failures regarding the stop of a
      backup
    + Wider coverage of unit tests
* Bug fixes:

    + Copies "recovery.conf" on the remote server during "barman
      recover" (#45)
    + Correctly detect pre/post archive hook scripts (#41)

Version 1.3.2 - 15 Apr 2014

* Fixed incompatibility with PostgreSQL 8.4 (Closes #40, bug
  introduced in version 1.3.1)

Version 1.3.1 - 14 Apr 2014

* Added support for concurrent backup of PostgreSQL 9.2 and 9.3
  servers that use the "pgespresso" extension. This feature is
  controlled by the "backup_options" configuration option (global/
  server) and activated when set to "concurrent_backup". Concurrent
  backup allows DBAs to perform full backup operations from a
  streaming replicated standby.
* Added the "barman diagnose" command which prints important
  information about the Barman system (extremely useful for support
  and problem solving)
* Improved error messages and exception handling interface
* Fixed bug in recovery of tablespaces that are created inside the
  PGDATA directory (bug introduced in version 1.3.0)
* Fixed minor bug of unhandled -q option, for quiet mode of
  commands to be used in cron jobs (bug introduced in version
  1.3.0)
* Minor bug fixes and code refactoring

Version 1.3.0 - 3 Feb 2014

* Refactored BackupInfo class for backup metadata to use the new
  FieldListFile class (infofile module)

* Refactored output layer to use a dedicated module, in order to
  facilitate integration with Nagios (NagiosOutputWriter class)

* Refactored subprocess handling in order to isolate stdin/stderr/
  stdout channels (command_wrappers module)

* Refactored hook scripts management

* Extracted logging configuration and userid enforcement from the
  configuration class.

* Support for hook scripts to be executed before and after a WAL
  file is archived, through the 'pre_archive_script' and
  'post_archive_script' configuration options.

* Implemented immediate checkpoint capability with
  --immediate-checkpoint command option and 'immediate_checkpoint'
  configuration option

* Implemented network compression for remote backup and recovery
  through the 'network_compression' configuration option (#19)

* Implemented the 'rebuild-xlogdb' command (Closes #27 and #28)

* Added deduplication of tablespaces located inside the PGDATA
  directory

* Refactored remote recovery code to work the same way local
  recovery does, by performing remote directory preparation
  (assuming the remote user has the right permissions on the remote
  server)

* 'barman backup' now tries and create server directories before
  attempting to execute a full backup (#14)

* Fixed bug #22: improved documentation for tablespaces relocation

* Fixed bug #31: 'barman cron' checks directory permissions for
  lock file

* Fixed bug #32: xlog.db read access during cron activities

Version 1.2.3 - 5 September 2013

* Added support for PostgreSQL 9.3

* Added support for the "--target-name" recovery option, which allows to
  restore to a named point previously specified with pg_create_restore_point
  (only for PostgreSQL 9.1 and above users)

* Fixed bug #27 about flock() usage with barman.lockfile (many thanks to
  Damon Snyder <damonsnyder at users.sf.net>)

* Introduced Python 3 compatibility

Version 1.2.2 - 24 June 2013

* Fix python 2.6 compatibility

Version 1.2.1 - 17 June 2013

* Added the "bandwidth_limit" global/server option which allows
  to limit the I/O bandwidth (in KBPS) for backup and recovery operations

* Added the "tablespace_bandwidth_limit" global/server option which allows
  to limit the I/O bandwidth (in KBPS) for backup and recovery operations
  on a per tablespace basis

* Added /etc/barman/barman.conf as default location

* Bug fix: avoid triggering the minimum_redundancy check
  on FAILED backups (thanks to Jérôme Vanandruel)

Version 1.2.0 - 31 Jan 2013

* Added the "retention_policy_mode" global/server option which defines
  the method for enforcing retention policies (currently only "auto")

* Added the "minimum_redundancy" global/server option which defines
  the minimum number of backups to be kept for a server

* Added the "retention_policy" global/server option which defines
  retention policies management based on redundancy (e.g. REDUNDANCY 4)
  or recovery window (e.g. RECOVERY WINDOW OF 3 MONTHS)

* Added retention policy support to the logging infrastructure, the
  "check" and the "status" commands

* The "check" command now integrates minimum redundancy control

* Added retention policy states (valid, obsolete and potentially obsolete)
  to "show-backup" and "list-backup" commands

* The 'all' keyword is now forbidden as server name

* Added basic support for Nagios plugin output to the 'check'
  command through the --nagios option

* Barman now requires argh => 0.21.2 and argcomplete-

* Minor bug fixes

Version 1.1.2 - 29 Nov 2012

* Added "configuration_files_directory" option that allows
  to include multiple server configuration files from a directory

* Support for special backup IDs: latest, last, oldest, first

* Management of  multiple servers to the 'list-backup' command.
  'barman list-backup all' now list backups for all the configured servers.

* Added "application_name" management for PostgreSQL >= 9.0

* Fixed bug #18: ignore missing WAL files if not found during delete

Version 1.1.1 - 16 Oct 2012

* Fix regressions in recover command.

Version 1.1.0 - 12 Oct 2012

* Support for hook scripts to be executed before and after
  a 'backup' command through the 'pre_backup_script' and 'post_backup_script'
  configuration options.

* Management of  multiple servers to the 'backup' command.
  'barman backup all' now iteratively backs up all the configured servers.

* Fixed bug #9: "9.2 issue with pg_tablespace_location()"

* Add warning in recovery when file location options have been defined
  in the postgresql.conf file (issue #10)

* Fail fast on recover command if the destination directory contains
  the ':' character (Closes: #4) or if an invalid tablespace
  relocation rule is passed

* Report an informative message when pg_start_backup() invocation
  fails because an exclusive backup is already running (Closes: #8)

Version 1.0.0 - 6 July 2012

* Backup of multiple PostgreSQL servers, with different versions. Versions
  from PostgreSQL 8.4+ are supported.

* Support for secure remote backup (through SSH)

* Management of a catalog of backups for every server, allowing users
  to easily create new backups, delete old ones or restore them

* Compression of WAL files that can be configured on a per server
  basis using compression/decompression filters, both predefined (gzip
  and bzip2) or custom

* Support for INI configuration file with global and per-server directives.
  Default location for configuration files are /etc/barman.conf or
  ~/.barman.conf. The '-c' option allows users to specify a different one

* Simple indexing of base backups and WAL segments that does not require
  a local database

* Maintenance mode (invoked through the 'cron' command) which performs
  ordinary operations such as WAL archival and compression, catalog
  updates, etc.

* Added the 'backup' command which takes a full physical base backup
  of the given PostgreSQL server configured in Barman

* Added the 'recover' command which performs local recovery of a given
  backup, allowing DBAs to specify a point in time. The 'recover' command
  supports relocation of both the PGDATA directory and, where applicable,
  the tablespaces

* Added the '--remote-ssh-command' option to the 'recover' command for
  remote recovery of a backup. Remote recovery does not currently support
  relocation of tablespaces

* Added the 'list-server' command that lists all the active servers
  that have been configured in barman

* Added the 'show-server' command that shows the relevant information
  for a given server, including all configuration options

* Added the 'status' command which shows information about the current
  state of a server, including Postgres version, current transaction ID,
  archive command, etc.

* Added the 'check' command which returns 0 if everything Barman needs
  is functioning correctly

* Added the 'list-backup' command that lists all the available backups
  for a given server, including size of the base backup and total size
  of the related WAL segments

* Added the 'show-backup' command that shows the relevant information
  for a given backup, including time of start, size, number of related
  WAL segments and their size, etc.

* Added the 'delete' command which removes a backup from the catalog

* Added the 'list-files' command which lists all the files for a
  single backup

* RPM Package for RHEL 5/6
