# Any known issues with choosing a custom datadir in the config file?

**URL:** <https://forums.foundationdb.org/t/any-known-issues-with-choosing-a-custom-datadir-in-the-config-file/1606>\
**Category:** Using FoundationDB\
**Created:** [September 3, 2019, 9:05pm UTC](https://forums.foundationdb.org/t/any-known-issues-with-choosing-a-custom-datadir-in-the-config-file/1606 "2019-09-03T21:05:50Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![zstokes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b3f665/32.png) [@zstokes](https://forums.foundationdb.org/u/zstokes)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2019, 9:05pm UTC](https://forums.foundationdb.org/t/any-known-issues-with-choosing-a-custom-datadir-in-the-config-file/1606/1 "2019-09-03T21:05:50Z")

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When using a custom datadir, ownership and perms set correctly using /var/lib/foundationdb/data/$ID, I get normal behavior:

```auto
Using cluster file `/etc/foundationdb/fdb.cluster'.

The database is available.

Welcome to the fdbcli. For help, type `help'.
fdb> status details

Using cluster file `/etc/foundationdb/fdb.cluster'.

Configuration:
  Redundancy mode - single
  Storage engine - memory-2
  Coordinators - 1

Cluster:
  FoundationDB processes - 1
  Machines - 1
  Memory availability - 6.9 GB per process on machine with least available
  Fault Tolerance - 0 machines
  Server time - 09/03/19 13:57:03

Data:
  Replication health - Healthy
  Moving data - 0.000 GB
  Sum of key-value sizes - 0 MB
  Disk space used - 105 MB

Operating space:
  Storage server - 1.0 GB free on most full server
  Log server - 62.5 GB free on most full server

Workload:
  Read rate - 18 Hz
  Write rate - 0 Hz
  Transactions started - 6 Hz
  Transactions committed - 0 Hz
  Conflict rate - 0 Hz

Backup and DR:
  Running backups - 0
  Running DRs - 0

Process performance details:
 blah.blah.blah.blah:4500 ( 1% cpu; 1% machine; 0.000 Gbps; 0% disk IO; 0.3 GB / 6.9 GB RAM )

Coordination servers:
 blah.blah.blah.blah:4500 (reachable)

Client time: 09/03/19 13:57:03

fdb>

```

But when I choose a custom datadir, ownership and perms exactly the same I get:

```auto
Using cluster file `/etc/foundationdb/fdb.cluster'.

The database is unavailable; type `status' for more information.

Welcome to the fdbcli. For help, type `help'.
fdb> status

Using cluster file `/etc/foundationdb/fdb.cluster'.

The coordinator(s) have no record of this database. Either the coordinator
addresses are incorrect, the coordination state on those machines is missing, or
no database has been created.

  blah.blah.blah.blah:4500 (reachable)

Unable to locate the data distributor worker.

Unable to locate the ratekeeper worker.

fdb> exit

```

RHEL 7.6 and FoundationDB Server 6.1.12

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![markus.pilman](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/foundationdb/user_avatar/forums.foundationdb.org/markus.pilman/32/379_2.png) [@markus.pilman](https://forums.foundationdb.org/u/markus.pilman)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2019, 9:21pm UTC](https://forums.foundationdb.org/t/any-known-issues-with-choosing-a-custom-datadir-in-the-config-file/1606/2 "2019-09-03T21:21:14Z")

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It seems you changed the data dir without moving the data? If you don’t care about losing data you can simply configure a new database: `fdbcli --exec 'configure new single ssd'` (or whatever you preferred config is). Otherwise you probably want to revert the config.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![zstokes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b3f665/32.png) [@zstokes](https://forums.foundationdb.org/u/zstokes)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2019, 9:39pm UTC](https://forums.foundationdb.org/t/any-known-issues-with-choosing-a-custom-datadir-in-the-config-file/1606/3 "2019-09-03T21:39:18Z")

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That did it. I didn’t realize that systemd was starting the server immediately after the `yum install`

Thanks!