Installing and Uninstalling a Plugin on the RDS Console

Scenarios

RDS allows you to install and uninstall plugins on the console.

RDS for PostgreSQL plugins only take effect on the databases you created the plugins for. To use a plugin on databases, it has to be created separately for each database.

Prerequisites

Before installing or uninstalling plugins, ensure that there are databases in your instance. For details about how to log in to a DB instance, see Connecting to an RDS for PostgreSQL Instance Through DAS (Recommended).

Precautions

• plpgsql is a built-in plugin and cannot be uninstalled.
• Logical replication plugins, such as decoderbufs and wal2json, can be used as-is. There is no installation required.
• Some plugins depend on the shared_preload_libraries parameter. They can be installed only after related libraries are loaded.
• pg_cron is only available to RDS for PostgreSQL 12 (12.11.0 and later), 13, and later versions. Before using this plugin, change the value of cron.database_name to the name of the database this plugin is used for (only one database is supported), and change the value of cron.use_background_workers to on.
• pltcl is not supported for RDS for PostgreSQL 13.2. To use this plugin, upgrade your instance to the latest minor version.
• Installing or uninstalling some plugins will cause their dependent plugins and tables to be installed or uninstalled synchronously. For example, when you install or uninstall postgis, postgis_sfcgal will be installed or uninstalled at the same time.
• Some plugins cannot be upgraded after a minor version upgrade. To upgrade them, uninstall and reinstall them.

Modifying the shared_preload_libraries Parameter

Some plugins require corresponding parameter values to be loaded before the plugins can be installed.

You can modify the shared_preload_libraries parameter to load parameter values in batches or load each required parameter value independently before installing a plugin.

1. Log in to the management console.
2. Click in the upper left corner and select a region and a project.
3. Click in the upper left corner of the page and choose Databases > Relational Database Service.
4. On the Instances page, click the instance name.
5. In the navigation pane, choose Plugins.
6. On the Plugins page, click next to Loaded shared_preload_libraries parameter values to view the loaded parameter values.
7. Click Modify Parameter Values.
   Figure 1 Viewing loaded parameter values
   

8. Select the parameter values to be loaded from the drop-down list box and click OK.
   Figure 2 Selecting parameter values to be loaded
   

9. In the displayed dialog box, click OK.
   

   • The modified parameter values take effect only after the instance is rebooted. If your instance has read replicas, the parameter values for the read replicas are also modified. You also need to reboot the read replicas.
   • To ensure security and O&M functions of RDS for PostgreSQL, the following parameter values are loaded by default and cannot be deleted:
     • passwordcheck.so
     • pg_stat_statements
     • pg_sql_history
     • pgaudit

10. You can also load each parameter value independently before installing a plugin.
    Figure 3 Loading a parameter value
    

Installing and Uninstalling a Plugin

1. Log in to the management console.
2. Click in the upper left corner and select a region and a project.
3. Click in the upper left corner of the page and choose Databases > Relational Database Service.
4. On the Instances page, click the instance name.
5. In the navigation pane, choose Plugins.
6. In the Database drop-down list above the plugin list, select the database where the plugin is to be installed.
7. Locate the plugin to be installed and click Install in the Operation column.
   Figure 4 Installing a plugin
   

8. After a minor version upgrade, click Update next to the plugin to be updated.
9. To uninstall a plugin, click Uninstall.
   Figure 5 Uninstalling a plugin