rake db:create throws "database does not exist" error with postgresql
Rails 4.1 ships with spring preloader, and
New Rails 4.1 applications will ship with "springified" binstubs. This means that bin/rails and bin/rake will automatically take advantage of preloaded spring environments.
which means that the "springified" bin/rake will attempt to preload the app, which in turn will attempt to run the initilizers resulting in the problem you're seeing.
To fix / work around this you want to run the initial setup rake tasks without spring. One way to achieve that is to run it with bundler instead:
bundle exec rake db:create
I found the issue ...
It has to do with Rails initializers: Rails seems to load all the initializers before executing bin/rake db:create.
And, in this particular application, there are a few custom initializers which depend on an ActiveRecord model (which, in turn, depends on the database being created, available and with the corresponding table).
Therefore rake never gets to actually execute the task, it fails when executing the initializers. I should have known if I had carefully read the full error message log. This is the full log (see below, in bold, the offending lines):
/home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/postgresql_adapter.rb:898:in `rescue in connect': FATAL: database "ds-dev" does not exist Run `$ bin/rake db:create db:migrate` to create your database (ActiveRecord::NoDatabaseError) from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/postgresql_adapter.rb:888:in `connect' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/postgresql_adapter.rb:568:in `initialize' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/postgresql_adapter.rb:41:in `new' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/postgresql_adapter.rb:41:in `postgresql_connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:435:in `new_connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:445:in `checkout_new_connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:416:in `acquire_connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:351:in `block in checkout' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/monitor.rb:211:in `mon_synchronize' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:350:in `checkout' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:265:in `block in connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/monitor.rb:211:in `mon_synchronize' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:264:in `connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/abstract/connection_pool.rb:541:in `retrieve_connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_handling.rb:113:in `retrieve_connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/connection_handling.rb:87:in `connection' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activerecord-4.1.5/lib/active_record/model_schema.rb:209:in `table_exists?' from /home/rs/pr/ds/app/models/property.rb:32:in `get' from /home/rs/pr/ds/config/initializers/custom/setup_mail.rb:3:in `' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:241:in `load' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:241:in `block in load' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:232:in `load_dependency' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:241:in `load' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/engine.rb:648:in `block in load_config_initializer' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/notifications.rb:161:in `instrument' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/engine.rb:647:in `load_config_initializer' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/engine.rb:612:in `block (2 levels) in ' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/engine.rb:611:in `each' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/engine.rb:611:in `block in ' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/initializable.rb:30:in `instance_exec' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/initializable.rb:30:in `run' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/initializable.rb:55:in `block in run_initializers' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:226:in `block in tsort_each' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:348:in `block (2 levels) in each_strongly_connected_component' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:418:in `block (2 levels) in each_strongly_connected_component_from' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:427:in `each_strongly_connected_component_from' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:417:in `block in each_strongly_connected_component_from' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/initializable.rb:44:in `each' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/initializable.rb:44:in `tsort_each_child' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:411:in `call' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:411:in `each_strongly_connected_component_from' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:347:in `block in each_strongly_connected_component' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:345:in `each' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:345:in `call' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:345:in `each_strongly_connected_component' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:224:in `tsort_each' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/tsort.rb:205:in `tsort_each' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/initializable.rb:54:in `run_initializers' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/railties-4.1.5/lib/rails/application.rb:300:in `initialize!' from /home/rs/pr/ds/config/environment.rb:5:in `' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:247:in `require' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:247:in `block in require' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:232:in `load_dependency' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/activesupport-4.1.5/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:247:in `require' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/spring-1.1.3/lib/spring/application.rb:92:in `preload' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/spring-1.1.3/lib/spring/application.rb:140:in `serve' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/spring-1.1.3/lib/spring/application.rb:128:in `block in run' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/spring-1.1.3/lib/spring/application.rb:122:in `loop' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/spring-1.1.3/lib/spring/application.rb:122:in `run' from /home/rs/.rvm/gems/ruby-2.1.2/gems/spring-1.1.3/lib/spring/application/boot.rb:18:in `' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:55:in `require' from /home/rs/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.1.2/lib/ruby/2.1.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb:55:in `require' from -e:1:in `'
I will work on refactoring the code, in order to get rid of any model dependencies in the initializers (which I'm pretty sure it must be a very bad practice).