pg_basebackup was introduced in Postgres 9.1 as a simple way to copy the data directory of a running database cluster. This was a great addition to a small group of PostgreSQL Client Applications.
The pg_basebackup approach differs from the standard pg_start_backup(), rsync (or other file system copy), pg_stop_backup() approach in that it uses the replication protocol over a standard Postgres connection to make the base backup. A few highlights: …