Documentation Source Text

<li>Transactions that involve changes against multiple [ATTACH | ATTACHed]
    databases are atomic for each individual database, but are not
    atomic across all databases as a set.
<li>It is not possible to change the [page_size] after entering WAL
    mode, either on an empty database or by using [VACUUM] or by restoring
    from a backup using the [backup API].  You must be in a rollback journal
    mode to change the page size.
<li>It is not possible to open [read-only WAL databases].
    The opening process must have write privileges for "<tt>-shm</tt>"
    [wal-index] shared memory file associated with the database, if that
    file exists, or else write access on the directory containing
    the database file if the "<tt>-shm</tt>" file does not exist.



<li>WAL might be very slightly slower (perhaps 1% or 2% slower)
    than the traditional rollback-journal approach
    in applications that do mostly reads and seldom write.
<li>There is an additional quasi-persistent "<tt>-wal</tt>" file and
    "<tt>-shm</tt>" shared memory file associated with each
    database, which can make SQLite less appealing for use as an 
    [application file-format].

<p>The WAL journal mode will be set on all
connections to the same database file if it is set on any one connection.
</p>

<tcl>hd_fragment {readonly} {read-only WAL databases}</tcl>
<h1>Read-Only Databases</h1>

<p>No SQLite database (regardless of whether or not it is WAL mode) is
readable if it is located on read-only media and it requires recovery.
So, for example, if an application crashes and leaves an SQLite database
with a [hot journal], that database cannot be opened unless the opening
process has write privilege on the database file, the directory
containing the database file, and the hot journal.  This is because the 
incomplete transaction left over from the crash must be rolled back prior 
to reading the database and that rollback cannot occur without write 
permission on all files and the directory containing them.</p>

<p>A database in WAL mode cannot generally be opened from read-only 
media because even ordinary reads in WAL mode require recovery-like
operations.</p>

<p>An efficient implementation of the [WAL read algorithm] requires that
there exist a hash table in shared memory over the content of the WAL file.
This hash table is called the [wal-index].
The wal-index is in shared memory, and so technically it does not have 
to have a name in the host computer filesystem.  Custom

[VFS] implementations are free to implement shared 
memory in any way they see fit, but the default unix and windows 
drivers that come built-in with SQLite implement shared memory
using <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mmap">mmapped files</a>

named using the suffix "<tt>-shm</tt>" and
located in the same directory as the database file.  The wal-index must
be rebuilt upon first access, even by readers, and so in order to open
the WAL database, write access is required on the "<tt>-shm</tt>" shared
memory file if the file exists, or else write access is required on the
directory containing the database so that the wal-index can be created if
it does not already exist.
This does not preclude custom VFS implementations that implement shared 

memory differently from being able to access read-only WAL databases, but
it does prevent the default unix and windows backends from accessing

WAL databases on read-only media.</p>


<p>Hence, SQLite databases should always be converted to 
[journal_mode | PRAGMA journal_mode=DELETE] prior to being transferred
to read-only media.</p>

<p>Also, if multiple processes are to access a WAL mode database, then
all processes should run under user or group IDs that give them write
access to the database files, the WAL file, the shared memory 
<tt>-shm</tt> file, and the containing directory.</p>

<tcl>hd_fragment bigwal {large WAL files} {avoiding large WAL files}</tcl>
<h1>Avoiding Excessively Large WAL Files</h1>

<p>In normal cases, new content is appended to the WAL file until the
WAL file accumulates about 1000 pages (and is thus about 4MB 
in size) at which point a checkpoint is automatically run and the WAL file