# awx-manage migrate "attempt to write a readonly database"

**URL:** <https://forum.ansible.com/t/awx-manage-migrate-attempt-to-write-a-readonly-database/28063>\
**Category:** AWX Project\
**Tags:** awx\
**Created:** [July 16, 2018, 11:24pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/awx-manage-migrate-attempt-to-write-a-readonly-database/28063 "2018-07-16T23:24:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Aaron\_Hicks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8797f3/32.png) [@Aaron\_Hicks](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Aaron_Hicks)\
**Post date:** [July 16, 2018, 11:24pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/awx-manage-migrate-attempt-to-write-a-readonly-database/28063/1 "2018-07-16T23:24:10Z")

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Hi the group,

I’m trying to initialize the PostgreSQL database for AWX, but it exists with an “attempt to write a readonly database”

I feel like this is because awx-manage is trying to create a fake initial database in sqlite3, but the file permissions or ownership aren’t correct. Where would this be created for me to check?

```auto
[awx@awx01 ~]$ awx-manage migrate --noinput --fake-initial
Operations to perform:
  Apply all migrations: auth, conf, contenttypes, djcelery, main, network_ui, oauth2_provider, sessions, sites, social_django, sso, taggit
Running migrations:
  Applying contenttypes.0001_initial...Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/local/bin/awx-manage", line 9, in <module>
    load_entry_point('awx', 'console_scripts', 'awx-manage')()
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/awx-1.0.6-py2.7.egg/awx/ __init__.py", line 109, in manage
    execute_from_command_line(sys.argv)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/management/ __init__.py", line 364, in execute_from_command_line
    utility.execute()
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/management/ __init__.py", line 356, in execute
    self.fetch_command(subcommand).run_from_argv(self.argv)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/management/base.py", line 283, in run_from_argv
    self.execute(*args, **cmd_options)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/management/base.py", line 330, in execute
    output = self.handle(*args, **options)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/management/commands/migrate.py", line 204, in handle
    fake_initial=fake_initial,
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/migrations/executor.py", line 115, in migrate
    state = self._migrate_all_forwards(state, plan, full_plan, fake=fake, fake_initial=fake_initial)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/migrations/executor.py", line 145, in _migrate_all_forwards
    state = self.apply_migration(state, migration, fake=fake, fake_initial=fake_initial)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/migrations/executor.py", line 244, in apply_migration
    state = migration.apply(state, schema_editor)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/migrations/migration.py", line 129, in apply
    operation.database_forwards(self.app_label, schema_editor, old_state, project_state)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/migrations/operations/models.py", line 97, in database_forwards
    schema_editor.create_model(model)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/backends/base/schema.py", line 303, in create_model
    self.execute(sql, params or None)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/backends/base/schema.py", line 120, in execute
    cursor.execute(sql, params)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/backends/utils.py", line 79, in execute
    return super(CursorDebugWrapper, self).execute(sql, params)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/backends/utils.py", line 64, in execute
    return self.cursor.execute(sql, params)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/utils.py", line 94, in __exit__
    six.reraise(dj_exc_type, dj_exc_value, traceback)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/backends/utils.py", line 62, in execute
    return self.cursor.execute(sql)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/django/db/backends/sqlite3/base.py", line 326, in execute
    return Database.Cursor.execute(self, query)
django.db.utils.OperationalError: attempt to write a readonly database

```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Christopher\_Meyers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Christopher\_Meyers](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Christopher_Meyers)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2018, 7:06pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/awx-manage-migrate-attempt-to-write-a-readonly-database/28063/2 "2018-08-01T19:06:02Z")

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sqlite is being chosen instead of postgres for the django storage backend. AWX developers use sqlite for running unit/functional tests. That settings switch is in an if statement in local\_settings.docker\_compose [https://github.com/ansible/awx/blob/devel/awx/settings/local\_settings.py.docker\_compose#L70](https://github.com/ansible/awx/blob/devel/awx/settings/local_settings.py.docker_compose#L70)

Since local\_settings.docker\_compose doesn’t end with .py it shouldn’t be processed.

Have you made any modifications that might trigger this sort of logic?