SQL version control methodology
- by Tom H.
There are several questions on SO about version control for SQL and lots of resources on the web, but I can't find something that quite covers what I'm trying to do.
First off, I'm talking about a methodology here. I'm familiar with the various source control applications out there and I'm familiar with tools like Red Gate's SQL Compare, etc. and I know how to write an application to check things in and out of my source control system automatically. If there is a tool which would be particularly helpful in providing a whole new methodology or which have a useful and uncommon functionality then great, but for the tasks mentioned above I'm already set.
The requirements that I'm trying to meet are:
The database schema and look-up table data are versioned
DML scripts for data fixes to larger tables are versioned
A server can be promoted from version N to version N + X where X may not always be 1
Code isn't duplicated within the version control system - for example, if I add a column to a table I don't want to have to make sure that the change is in both a create script and an alter script
The system needs to support multiple clients who are at various versions for the application (trying to get them all up to within 1 or 2 releases, but not there yet)
Some organizations keep incremental change scripts in their version control and to get from version N to N + 3 you would have to run scripts for N-N+1 then N+1-N+2 then N+2-N+3. Some of these scripts can be repetitive (for example, a column is added but then later it is altered to change the data type). We're trying to avoid that repetitiveness since some of the client DBs can be very large, so these changes might take longer than necessary.
Some organizations will simply keep a full database build script at each version level then use a tool like SQL Compare to bring a database up to one of those versions. The problem here is that intermixing DML scripts can be a problem. Imagine a scenario where I add a column, use a DML script to fill said column, then in a later version that column name is changed.
Perhaps there is some hybrid solution? Maybe I'm just asking for too much? Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated though.
If the moderators think that this would be more appropriate as a community wiki, please let me know.
Thanks!
