initdb: error: could not change permissions of directory

[AlexanderProd]

I'm using the latest timescale/timescaledb-ha:pg16.2-ts2.14.2-all Docker image, but I'm still getting the

initdb: error: could not change permissions of directory "/var/lib/postgresql/data": Operation not permitted
fixing permissions on existing directory /var/lib/postgresql/data ... %                                     

error like in issue https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb-docker-ha/issues/359 when providing the PGDATA env variable.

My docker-compose config looks like this:

timescaledb16:
    image: timescale/timescaledb-ha:pg16.2-ts2.14.2-all
    volumes:
      - timescaledb16_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    ports:
      - '5436:5432'
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: postgres
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: postgres
      DB_NAME: xxxx
      PGUSER: xxxx
      PGPASSWORD: xxxx
      PGDATA: /var/lib/postgresql/data

volumes:
  timescaledb16_data: null

Like described in this reply https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb-docker-ha/issues/359#issuecomment-1695094508, a workaround is to provide a local path for the volume and to manally set the permissions. And when I do it like this it works.

But that doesn't work when you want to let docker handle the directory.

Also I have noticed that when ever I run docker compose down and docker compose up a new anonymous volume is created. Even though I have provided a named volume in the dockercompose file and this is actually being used.

[AlexanderProd]

I found a workaround by mounting the volume to this path inside the container

timescaledb16_data:/home/postgres/pgdata/data

and not setting the PGDATA env. When configured like that, everything works fine.

[jeniceek]

I've ran into same issue. Check whether you have userns-remap in Docker. If so try to add userns_mode: "host" to service definition.

[fuomag9]

Same issue with the following:

services:
  timescaledb:
        container_name: timescaledb
        restart: always
        ports:
            - 5432:5432
        volumes:
            - ./data:/home/postgres/pgdata/data
        environment:
            - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=password
        image: timescale/timescaledb-ha:pg16