51.73. pg_locks

The view pg_locks provides access to information about the locks held by active processes within the database server. See Chapter 13 for more discussion of locking.

pg_locks contains one row per active lockable object, requested lock mode, and relevant process. Thus, the same lockable object might appear many times, if multiple processes are holding or waiting for locks on it. However, an object that currently has no locks on it will not appear at all.

There are several distinct types of lockable objects: whole relations (e.g., tables), individual pages of relations, individual tuples of relations, transaction IDs (both virtual and permanent IDs), and general database objects (identified by class OID and object OID, in the same way as in pg_description or pg_depend). Also, the right to extend a relation is represented as a separate lockable object, as is the right to update pg_database.datfrozenxid. Also, “advisory” locks can be taken on numbers that have user-defined meanings.

Table 51.74. pg_locks Columns

Column Type Description
locktype text Type of the lockable object: relation, extend, frozenid, page, tuple, transactionid, virtualxid, spectoken, object, userlock, or advisory. (See also Table 27.11.)
database oid (references pg_database.oid) OID of the database in which the lock target exists, or zero if the target is a shared object, or null if the target is a transaction ID
relation oid (references pg_class.oid) OID of the relation targeted by the lock, or null if the target is not a relation or part of a relation
page int4 Page number targeted by the lock within the relation, or null if the target is not a relation page or tuple
tuple int2 Tuple number targeted by the lock within the page, or null if the target is not a tuple
virtualxid text Virtual ID of the transaction targeted by the lock, or null if the target is not a virtual transaction ID
transactionid xid ID of the transaction targeted by the lock, or null if the target is not a transaction ID
classid oid (references pg_class.oid) OID of the system catalog containing the lock target, or null if the target is not a general database object
objid oid (references any OID column) OID of the lock target within its system catalog, or null if the target is not a general database object
objsubid int2 Column number targeted by the lock (the classid and objid refer to the table itself), or zero if the target is some other general database object, or null if the target is not a general database object
virtualtransaction text Virtual ID of the transaction that is holding or awaiting this lock
pid int4 Process ID of the server process holding or awaiting this lock, or null if the lock is held by a prepared transaction
mode text Name of the lock mode held or desired by this process (see Section 13.3.1 and Section 13.2.3)
granted bool True if lock is held, false if lock is awaited
fastpath bool True if lock was taken via fast path, false if taken via main lock table

granted 為 true 的話，代表此鎖定由該筆資料的程序所持有。False 表示此程序目前正在等待取得鎖定，這意味著至少一個其他程序正持有或等待同一可鎖定物件上在鎖定模式有衝突。等待的程序將會一直休眠，直到另一個鎖定被釋放（或檢測到 deadlock 情況）為止。一個程序等待最多只可以取得一個鎖定。

在整個交易事務執行過程中，伺服器程序對事務的虛擬事務 ID 持有排他鎖定(exclusive lock)。如果將永久性 ID 分配給事務（通常僅在事務變更資料庫狀態時才會發生），它還會對事務的永久性事務 ID 持有排他鎖定，直到結束。當一個程序發現有必要專門等待另一個事務結束時，它透過嘗試獲取另一個事務的 ID（取決於情況的虛擬 ID 或永久 ID）上的共享鎖定(share lock)來做到這一點。僅當另一個事務結束並釋放其鎖定時，該操作才會成功。

儘管 tuple 是可鎖定的物件型別，但是有關資料列級鎖定的資訊是儲存在磁碟上，而不是儲存在記憶體之中，因此資料列級的鎖定通常不會出現在此檢視表中。如果程序正在等待資料列級的鎖定，則它通常在檢視表中顯示為正在等待該資料列鎖定目前持有者的永久事務 ID。

Advisory locks can be acquired on keys consisting of either a single bigint value or two integer values. A bigint key is displayed with its high-order half in the classid column, its low-order half in the objid column, and objsubid equal to 1. The original bigint value can be reassembled with the expression (classid::bigint << 32) | objid::bigint. Integer keys are displayed with the first key in the classid column, the second key in the objid column, and objsubid equal to 2. The actual meaning of the keys is up to the user. Advisory locks are local to each database, so the database column is meaningful for an advisory lock.

pg_locks provides a global view of all locks in the database cluster, not only those relevant to the current database. Although its relation column can be joined against pg_class.oid to identify locked relations, this will only work correctly for relations in the current database (those for which the database column is either the current database's OID or zero).

The pid column can be joined to the pid column of the pg_stat_activity view to get more information on the session holding or awaiting each lock, for example

SELECT * FROM pg_locks pl LEFT JOIN pg_stat_activity psa
    ON pl.pid = psa.pid;

Also, if you are using prepared transactions, the virtualtransaction column can be joined to the transaction column of the pg_prepared_xacts view to get more information on prepared transactions that hold locks. (A prepared transaction can never be waiting for a lock, but it continues to hold the locks it acquired while running.) For example:

SELECT * FROM pg_locks pl LEFT JOIN pg_prepared_xacts ppx
    ON pl.virtualtransaction = '-1/' || ppx.transaction;

While it is possible to obtain information about which processes block which other processes by joining pg_locks against itself, this is very difficult to get right in detail. Such a query would have to encode knowledge about which lock modes conflict with which others. Worse, the pg_locks view does not expose information about which processes are ahead of which others in lock wait queues, nor information about which processes are parallel workers running on behalf of which other client sessions. It is better to use the pg_blocking_pids() function (see Table 9.63) to identify which process(es) a waiting process is blocked behind.

The pg_locks view displays data from both the regular lock manager and the predicate lock manager, which are separate systems; in addition, the regular lock manager subdivides its locks into regular and fast-path locks. This data is not guaranteed to be entirely consistent. When the view is queried, data on fast-path locks (with fastpath = true) is gathered from each backend one at a time, without freezing the state of the entire lock manager, so it is possible for locks to be taken or released while information is gathered. Note, however, that these locks are known not to conflict with any other lock currently in place. After all backends have been queried for fast-path locks, the remainder of the regular lock manager is locked as a unit, and a consistent snapshot of all remaining locks is collected as an atomic action. After unlocking the regular lock manager, the predicate lock manager is similarly locked and all predicate locks are collected as an atomic action. Thus, with the exception of fast-path locks, each lock manager will deliver a consistent set of results, but as we do not lock both lock managers simultaneously, it is possible for locks to be taken or released after we interrogate the regular lock manager and before we interrogate the predicate lock manager.

Locking the regular and/or predicate lock manager could have some impact on database performance if this view is very frequently accessed. The locks are held only for the minimum amount of time necessary to obtain data from the lock managers, but this does not completely eliminate the possibility of a performance impact.\