Question 84899 in Docker Question posted in
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How to delete Postgres files in Docker container

I would like to delete my postgres volume and start over (learning the process). When I enter the postgres container using docker exec -it [container_id] sh I can see the postgres files like this: ls var/lib/postgresql/data/.

When I try to delete these files using rm -r var/lib/postgresql/ I get:

rm: can’t remove ‘var/lib/postgresql/data’: Resource busy

If I stop this container, I will not be able to delete the volume. How can I delete it?

Fwiw my docker-compose looks as such:

services:
  db:
    container_name: postgres
    image: postgres:13-alpine
    volumes:
      - ./postgres:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    env_file:
      - .env

Edit:

The docker-compose is pulled from my GitHub. I am not sure where any of the files are on the server. NVM, found them. Thanks.

Tags:

2

Answers


  1. 0

    The contents you can access from inside the container at /var/lib/postgresql/data, are the contents of the subdirectory postgres in the host machine, so you could add or remove files from the host machine

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  2. 0

    You mounted ./postgres from your host system at ยด/var/lib/postgresql/data` in your docker container:

    volumes:
      - ./postgres:/var/lib/postgresql/data

    So just navigate to ./postgres on your host system and delete the content.

    You even can use Finder/Explorer to do this.
    See also: https://docs.docker.com/storage/bind-mounts/

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