[vanviegen]

Only if you can freeze your application for that long, in which case your statement is true for all non-broken databases.

[markusw]

You can easily do consistent backup on live databases. There’s a backup command and API.

[vanviegen]

Sure. But then it's not "just a file" copy, like GP said.

[wild_egg]

It only freezes your application if you've misconfigured it.

[vanviegen]

If you want to backup your database using just a file copy, you'd better freeze your database if you value your data. Or use a fancy snapshotting filesystem.