Postgres - FATAL: database files are incompatible with server

Question

After restarting my MacBook Pro I am unable to start the database server:

could not connect to server: No such file or directory
Is the server running local         


        

Answer 1

If you are looking for the nuclear option (delete all data and get a fresh database), you can do:

rm -rf /usr/local/var/postgres && initdb /usr/local/var/postgres -E utf8

and then you'll need to rake db:setup and rake db:migrate from your Rails app to get setup again.