pgwire-replication

A low-level, high-performance PostgreSQL logical replication client implemented directly on top of the PostgreSQL wire protocol (pgwire).

This crate is designed for CDC, change streaming, and WAL replay systems that require explicit control over replication state, deterministic restart behavior, and minimal runtime overhead.

pgwire-replication intentionally avoids libpq, tokio-postgres, and other higher-level PostgreSQL clients for the replication path. It interacts with a Postgres instance directly and relies on START_REPLICATION ... LOGICAL ... and the built-in pgoutput output plugin.

pgwire-replication exists to provide:

• a direct pgwire implementation for logical replication
• explicit, user-controlled LSN start and stop semantics
• predictable feedback and backpressure behavior
• clean integration into async systems and coordinators

This crate was originally extracted from the Deltaforge CDC project and is maintained independently.

Installation

Add to your Cargo.toml:

[dependencies]
pgwire-replication = "0.5.0"

Or with specific features:

[dependencies]
pgwire-replication = { version = "0.5.0", default-features = false, features = ["tls-rustls"] }

Requirements

• Rust 1.88 or later
• PostgreSQL 15+ with logical replication enabled (older versions will probably work too)

Features

• Logical replication using the PostgreSQL wire protocol
• pgoutput logical decoding support (transport-level)
• Explicit LSN seek (start_lsn)
• pg_logical_emit_message() support
• Bounded replay (stop_at_lsn)
• Change-driven standby status updates: an acknowledged LSN reaches the server within status_interval, also on an idle stream
• Initial acknowledged position (ack_lsn) independent of the start position
• Backpressure-safe feedback: keepalives keep flowing even when a slow consumer fills the event buffer, avoiding wal_sender_timeout resets
• Multiple publications per replication slot
• Optional pgoutput binary output format (PG 14+)
• Pull-based replication metrics (ReplicationClient::metrics()) and a feedback observer reporting how long acknowledged positions waited
• Configurable per-message size limit (max_message_size), refused with a typed MessageTooLarge error
• Gated sessions: run IDENTIFY_SYSTEM, TIMELINE_HISTORY or SQL on the replication connection before START_REPLICATION
• Start confirmation (wait_started): know when the server accepted START_REPLICATION and the slot is held
• Keepalive handling
• Tokio-based async client
• SCRAM-SHA-256 authentication (MD5 behind the md5 feature)
• TLS/mTLS support (via rustls)
• Connection-level configs via the startup options parameter (e.g. pin TimeZone/IntervalStyle/DateStyle for deterministic decoded output)
• Configurable startup application_name
• Unix domain socket connections (libpq-compatible: host starts with /)
• Designed for checkpoint and replay-based systems

Non-goals

This crate intentionally does not provide:

• A general-purpose SQL client (a gated session can run a few queries on the replication connection before it starts streaming, nothing more)
• Automatic checkpoint persistence
• Exactly-once semantics
• Schema management or DDL interpretation
• Full pgoutput decoding into rows or events

These responsibilities belong in higher layers.

Basic usage

use pgwire_replication::{ReplicationClient, ReplicationEvent};

let mut repl = ReplicationClient::connect(config).await?;

while let Some(event) = repl.recv().await? {
    match event {
        ReplicationEvent::XLogData { wal_end, data, .. } => {
            process(data);
            repl.update_applied_lsn(wal_end);
        }
        ReplicationEvent::KeepAlive { .. } => {}
        ReplicationEvent::Begin { .. } | ReplicationEvent::Commit { .. } => {}
        ReplicationEvent::Message { prefix, content, .. } => {
            // User-defined message from pg_logical_emit_message()
            handle_message(prefix, content);
        }
        ReplicationEvent::StoppedAt { .. } => break,
    }
}
// Clean end-of-stream

Check the Quick Start and Examples for more detailed use cases.

Seek and Replay Semantics

pgwire-replication is built around explicit WAL position control. LSNs (Log Sequence Numbers) are treated as first-class inputs and outputs and are never hidden behind opaque offsets.

Starting from an LSN (Seek)

Every replication session begins at an explicit LSN:

let cfg = ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, publication)
    .with_start_lsn(start_lsn);

This enables:

• resuming replication after a crash
• replaying WAL from a known checkpoint
• controlled historical backfills

The provided LSN is sent verbatim to PostgreSQL via START_REPLICATION.

Bounded Replay (Start -> Stop)

Replication can be bounded using stop_at_lsn:

let cfg = ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, publication)
    .with_start_lsn(start_lsn)
    .with_stop_lsn(stop_lsn);

When configured:

• replication starts at start_lsn
• WAL is streamed until the stop LSN is reached
• a ReplicationEvent::StoppedAt { reached } event is emitted
• After StoppedAt is emitted, the stream ends cleanly and recv() returns Ok(None)
• the replication connection is terminated cleanly using CopyDone

This enables:

• deterministic WAL replay
• offline backfills
• "replay up to checkpoint" workflows
• controlled reprocessing in recovery scenarios

Progress Tracking and Feedback

Progress is not auto-committed. Instead, the consumer explicitly reports progress:

repl.update_applied_lsn(lsn);

Calling update_applied_lsn indicates that all WAL up to lsn has been durably persisted by the consumer (for example, flushed to disk or a message queue).

This allows callers to control:

• durability boundaries
• batching behavior
• exactly-once or at-least-once semantics (implemented externally)

Updates are monotonic: reporting an older LSN is a no-op. Standby status updates are sent asynchronously by the worker using the latest applied LSN: a raised LSN within status_interval of the last update, also on an idle stream, and at once when the server requests a reply. For CDC pipelines, progress should typically be reported at transaction commit boundaries, not for every message.

Initial acknowledged position

Until the first update_applied_lsn, the worker reports start_lsn as flushed and applied. A consumer that resumes reading from a position it has not made durable (for example, replaying from a slot's restart_lsn after a crash) sets ack_lsn to its durable position instead, so the slot's confirmed_flush_lsn never advances past what it could recover from:

let cfg = ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, publication)
    .with_start_lsn(read_from)
    .with_ack_lsn(durable);

Backpressure

The event channel between the worker and your consumer is bounded (buffer_events). If the consumer falls behind and the channel fills, the worker does not block silently: it keeps sending standby-status feedback every status_interval while waiting for capacity, so PostgreSQL never trips wal_sender_timeout and resets the stream (which would force a full replay from confirmed_flush). Real backpressure still propagates to the server through TCP flow control, and feedback reports only the applied LSN, so nothing is acknowledged that the consumer has not durably processed.

Message size limit

max_message_size bounds the largest backend message payload the worker accepts (default and maximum: 1 GiB). The buffer is sized from the length the server announces, so this caps the memory one message can take:

let cfg = ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, publication)
    .with_max_message_size(64 * 1024 * 1024);

A larger message is refused before any of it is buffered, with PgWireError::MessageTooLarge { payload_bytes, limit_bytes }. The refusal is terminal: the payload may carry WAL changes, so it is never skipped, and the stream ends. Each row change arrives as one message, so a single wide row must fit. The limit bounds one message, not a transaction, the event buffer or total memory. It also bounds each row of a gated session's queries.

Gated sessions and start confirmation

connect returns before the server has accepted START_REPLICATION: connecting, authentication and the start run in the background worker. wait_started returns once the server accepted it, when the slot is held by this session, or the worker's error if it ended first:

let mut client = ReplicationClient::connect(cfg).await?;
client.wait_started().await?;

connect_gated authenticates and then waits. On that one session you can run replication commands or SQL with the simple query protocol, then start streaming. What you read before the start describes the server the stream opens on, with no window for a failover in between:

let mut client = ReplicationClient::connect_gated(cfg).await?;
let system = client.identify_system().await?; // system_id, timeline, xlogpos, dbname
if system.timeline > 1 {
    let history = client.timeline_history(system.timeline).await?;
    // history.filename, history.content
}
let rows = client.simple_query("SELECT pg_is_in_recovery()").await?; // text values, None for NULL
client.start().await?;
client.wait_started().await?;

A server error from a query leaves the session usable. Dropping the client before start ends the session without starting replication.

Startup parameters

• with_options("-c datestyle=ISO,MDY -c intervalstyle=iso_8601") sets the startup options parameter, like libpq's options / PGOPTIONS, to pin session GUCs so decoded text values render deterministically.
• with_application_name("my-cdc-7f3a") sets the application_name shown in pg_stat_activity and pg_stat_replication (default pgwire-replication), so a consumer can tell its own walsender from other sessions.

Multiple publications

A single slot can subscribe to more than one publication. Pass a single name or a collection to new() / unix():

// one publication
ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, "orders");

// several publications on the same slot
ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, ["orders", "customers"]);

The publication set is bound once at START_REPLICATION and is fixed for the connection's lifetime; to change it, reconnect with a new config.

Binary output

By default pgoutput emits column values in text format. Set binary to request PostgreSQL's binary wire format (PostgreSQL 14+):

ReplicationConfig::new(host, user, password, database, slot, publication)
    .with_binary(true);

The library forwards XLogData payloads unchanged, so your decoder must handle binary values. Any column type without a binary send function makes the walsender error and close the stream, so leave this off unless you control both ends.

Observability

ReplicationClient::metrics() returns an Arc<ReplicationMetrics> with pull-based counters you can scrape into your own metrics system:

let metrics = client.metrics();
// ... later, from any task ...
println!(
    "events={} feedback={} stalls={} stall_us={}",
    metrics.events_forwarded(),
    metrics.feedback_sent(),
    metrics.stall_count(),
    metrics.stall_micros_total(),
);

Counters include events forwarded, feedback sent, keepalive replies, stall count and cumulative stall duration, and the last applied / server WAL-end LSNs. Reads never block the worker.

A feedback observer reports how long each acknowledged position waited before a standby status update told the server about it:

use pgwire_replication::FeedbackObserver;

let cfg = cfg.with_feedback_observer(FeedbackObserver::new(|sent| {
    record_feedback_delay(sent.pending_for); // runs on the worker: keep it cheap
}));

It is called after each successful update that advanced the reported position. Coalesced acknowledgments report the oldest wait. If a session fails before reporting, feedback_pending_since() on the old client and carry_feedback_pending() on its replacement keep the wait across sessions. Without an observer, no clock is read.

Idle behavior

PostgreSQL logical replication may remain silent for extended periods when no WAL is generated. This is normal.

idle_wakeup_interval does not indicate failure. It bounds how long the client may block waiting for server messages before waking up to send a standby status update and continue waiting. While the system is idle and nothing new is acknowledged, the feedback cadence is bounded by idle_wakeup_interval; a newly applied LSN is still sent within status_interval.

Logical Decoding Messages

PostgreSQL's pg_logical_emit_message() lets applications write custom messages into the WAL stream. These are surfaced as ReplicationEvent::Message events:

ReplicationEvent::Message {
    transactional: bool,  // true if emitted inside a transaction
    lsn: Lsn,            // WAL position of the message
    prefix: String,       // application-defined prefix
    content: Bytes,       // raw message payload
}

NB: Messages are always enabled in the pgoutput protocol options.

Non-transactional messages (SELECT pg_logical_emit_message(false, ...)) are delivered immediately and are not tied to any transaction boundary.

Transactional messages (SELECT pg_logical_emit_message(true, ...)) are delivered only after the enclosing transaction commits, appearing between Begin and Commit events.

Use cases include:

• application-level checkpoint markers
• out-of-band coordination signals
• schema migration fencing
• custom CDC control messages

Unix Domain Sockets

On Unix systems, pgwire-replication supports connecting via Unix domain sockets. Following libpq convention, set host to the socket directory path:

let config = ReplicationConfig::unix(
    "/var/run/postgresql",  // socket directory
    5432,                    // port (used to form .s.PGSQL.5432)
    "replicator",
    "secret",
    "mydb",
    "my_slot",
    "my_pub",
);

Or equivalently, since any host starting with / is treated as a socket directory, pass one to new(...):

let config = ReplicationConfig::new(
    "/var/run/postgresql", // host as socket directory
    "replicator",
    "secret",
    "mydb",
    "my_slot",
    "my_pub",
)
.with_port(5432);

Any host starting with / is treated as a Unix socket directory. The actual socket file used is {host}/.s.PGSQL.{port}.

TLS is not supported over Unix sockets (not needed). Requesting a TLS mode other than Disable with a Unix socket host will return an error.

Shutdown

• stop() requests a graceful stop (sends CopyDone). The client will continue to yield any buffered events and then recv() returns Ok(None).
• shutdown().await is a convenience method that calls stop(), drains remaining events, and awaits the worker task result.
• abort() cancels the worker task immediately (hard stop; does not send CopyDone).

Dropping ReplicationClient requests a best-effort graceful stop. When dropped inside a Tokio runtime, the worker is detached and allowed to finish cleanly; when dropped outside a runtime, the worker may be aborted to avoid leaking a task.

Important Notes on LSN Semantics

PostgreSQL logical replication delivers complete, committed transactions in commit order. This has important implications for LSN handling:

• Commit LSNs are strictly monotonically increasing across the replication stream.
• Within a single transaction, event LSNs are monotonically increasing.
• Across transactions, event LSNs are not monotonic. Concurrent transactions interleave their writes in WAL, so a later transaction in the stream may contain events with lower LSNs than the previous transaction.
• The tuple (commit_lsn, event_lsn) provides a total ordering suitable for checkpointing and replay.
• LSNs are not dense: LSNs are byte offsets into the WAL, not sequential counters. Gaps between consecutive events are normal.

For CDC pipelines, progress tracking should typically be based on commit boundaries rather than individual event LSNs.

LSNs are formatted exactly as PostgreSQL displays them:

• uppercase hexadecimal
• X/Y format
• up to 8 hex digits per part
• leading zeros omitted

Examples: 0/0, 0/16B6C50, 16/B374D848

Parsing accepts both padded and unpadded forms for compatibility.

Errors

All errors are PgWireError, which is #[non_exhaustive]: match it with a _ arm. Predicates such as is_io(), is_server(), is_auth(), is_tls(), is_message_too_large() and is_transient() classify an error without matching on variants.

Upgrading from 0.4

• PgWireError is now #[non_exhaustive], so an exhaustive match needs a _ arm.
• New PgWireError::MessageTooLarge variant. A refused oversized message is terminal.
• New ReplicationConfig fields (ack_lsn, application_name, max_message_size, feedback_observer) and builders. ReplicationConfig is #[non_exhaustive], so code that uses new() / unix() and the with_* builders is unaffected.
• New ReplicationClient APIs: wait_started, connect_gated, simple_query, identify_system, timeline_history, start, feedback_pending_since and carry_feedback_pending.
• Standby status updates are change-driven: an acknowledged LSN is sent within status_interval, also on an idle stream, where it previously waited for the next idle wakeup or server keepalive.

TLS support

TLS is optional and uses rustls. TLS configuration is provided explicitly via ReplicationConfig and does not rely on system OpenSSL.

Quick start

Control plane (publication/slot creation) is typically done using a proper "Postgres client" (Your choice). This crate handles only the replication plane.

use pgwire_replication::{
    client::ReplicationEvent, Lsn, ReplicationClient, ReplicationConfig, SslMode, TlsConfig,
};

#[tokio::main]
async fn main() -> anyhow::Result<()> {
    // Control plane (publication/slot creation) is typically done using a Postgres client.
    // This crate implements the replication plane only.

    // Use a real LSN:
    // - from your checkpoint store, or
    // - from SQL (pg_current_wal_lsn / slot confirmed_flush_lsn), or
    // - from a previous run.
    let start_lsn = Lsn::parse("0/16B6C50")?;

    // ReplicationConfig is #[non_exhaustive]: build it with new()/unix() and the
    // with_* methods. A single publication name is accepted directly; pass an
    // array (e.g. ["pub_a", "pub_b"]) to subscribe to several at once.
    let cfg = ReplicationConfig::new(
        "127.0.0.1",
        "postgres",
        "postgres",
        "postgres",
        "my_slot",
        "my_pub",
    )
    .with_tls(TlsConfig::disabled())
    .with_start_lsn(start_lsn)
    .with_status_interval(std::time::Duration::from_secs(10))
    .with_wakeup_interval(std::time::Duration::from_secs(10));

    let mut client = ReplicationClient::connect(cfg).await?;

    loop {
        match client.recv().await {
            Ok(Some(ev)) => match ev {
                ReplicationEvent::XLogData { wal_end, data, .. } => {
                    println!("XLogData wal_end={wal_end} bytes={}", data.len());
                    client.update_applied_lsn(wal_end);
                }
                ReplicationEvent::KeepAlive {
                    wal_end,
                    reply_requested,
                    ..
                } => {
                    println!("KeepAlive wal_end={wal_end} reply_requested={reply_requested}");
                }
                ReplicationEvent::StoppedAt { reached } => {
                    println!("StoppedAt reached={reached}");
                    // break is optional; the stream should end shortly anyway
                    break;
                }
                ReplicationEvent::Begin { .. } | ReplicationEvent::Commit { .. } => {}
                ReplicationEvent::Message { prefix, content, .. } => {
                    println!("Message prefix={prefix:?} bytes={}", content.len());
                }
            },
            Ok(None) => {
                println!("Replication ended cleanly");
                break;
            }
            Err(e) => {
                eprintln!("Replication failed: {e}");
                return Err(e.into());
            }
        }
    }
    Ok(())
}

Examples

Examples connect to 127.0.0.1:5432 as postgres/postgres unless PGHOST, PGPORT, PGUSER, PGPASSWORD, PGDATABASE, PGSLOT and PGPUBLICATION say otherwise (control_and_stream uses these defaults as fixed values). Those that create the publication and slot use tokio-postgres, a dev-dependency, so no extra feature is needed.

Replication plane only: examples/basic.rs

START_LSN="0/16B6C50" cargo run --example basic

Control-plane + streaming: examples/control_and_stream.rs

cargo run --example control_and_stream

Checkpoint boundaries: examples/checkpointed.rs

cargo run --example checkpointed

Bounded replay: examples/bounded_replay.rs

cargo run --example bounded_replay

With TLS enabled: examples/with_tls.rs

PGHOST=db.example.com \
PGPORT=5432 \
PGUSER=repl_user \
PGPASSWORD=secret \
PGDATABASE=postgres \
PGSLOT=example_slot_tls \
PGPUBLICATION=example_pub_tls \
PGTLS_CA=/path/to/ca.pem \
PGTLS_SNI=db.example.com \
cargo run --example with_tls

Enabling mTLS : examples/with_mtls.rs

Inject the fake dns record, if you need to:

sudo sh -c 'echo "127.0.0.1 db.example.com" >> /etc/hosts'

and then:

PGHOST=db.example.com \
PGPORT=5432 \
PGUSER=repl_user \
PGPASSWORD=secret \
PGDATABASE=postgres \
PGSLOT=example_slot_mtls \
PGPUBLICATION=example_pub_mtls \
PGTLS_CA=/etc/ssl/ca.pem \
PGTLS_CLIENT_CERT=/etc/ssl/client.crt.pem \
PGTLS_CLIENT_KEY=/etc/ssl/client.key.pem \
PGTLS_SNI=db.example.com \
cargo run --example with_mtls

• PGUSER/PGPASSWORD are used for control-plane setup (publication/slot).
• REPL_USER/REPL_PASSWORD are used for the replication stream.
• If PGHOST is an IP address, you must set PGTLS_SNI to a DNS name on the cert.
• Client key should be PKCS#8 PEM for best compatibility.
• VerifyCa can be used instead of VerifyFull if hostname validation is not possible.

Testing

Integration tests use Docker via testcontainers and are gated behind a feature flag:

cargo test --features integration-tests -- --nocapture

The loom model of the progress signalling runs under its own cfg:

RUSTFLAGS="--cfg pgwire_loom" CARGO_TARGET_DIR=target/loom cargo test --release --lib loom_model

License

Licensed under either of:

• Apache License, Version 2.0
• MIT License

at your option.