I just tried installing Postgresql on a pretty standard/untweaked Ubuntu installation, and I got: Setting up postgresql-8.4 (8.4.1-1) … * Starting PostgreSQL 8.4 database server * The PostgreSQL server failed to start. Please check the log output. [fail] invoke-rc.d: initscript postgresql-8.4, action “start” failed. dpkg: error processing postgresql-8.4 (–configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error [...]