How can I stop a Postgres script when it encounters an error?

Question

Is there a way to specify that when executing a sql script it stops when encountering the first error on the script, it usually continues, regardless of previous errors.

Answer 1

I assume you are using psql, this might be handy to add to your ~/.psqlrc file.

\set ON_ERROR_STOP on

This will make it abort on the first error. If you don't have it, even with a transaction it will keep executing your script but fail on everything until the end of your script.

And you probably want to use a transaction as Paul said. Which also can be done with psql --single-transaction ... if you don't want to alter the script.

So a complete example, with ON_ERROR_STOP in your .psqlrc:

psql --single-transaction --file /your/script.sql