From Manual to Automated Database Schema Migrations
Software teams commonly embrace DevOps for delivery, creating automated CI/CD pipelines that allow for rapid and reliable software delivery. Suprisingly, some of these same teams still manage their database schema manually, causing an interesting contrast.
Picture this: a team spent countless hours ensuring that every change to their application code is:
- Version controlled
- Automatically tested, built, and stored in an Artifact Repository
- Automatically deployed
- Easily rolled back
Yet when it comes to making changes to their database schema, the process looks very different: a developer writes a SQL migration script, connects to the production database with privileged access, runs the script manually, and (if successful) continues with deployment. The entire process is in the hands of the developer.
Projects frequently begin with manual database schema management because it's the easiest option, particularly when databases are small, changes are infrequent, and there are no users. However, as applications evolve and schema migrations grow more complex, this practice becomes a looming risk.
Let's explore the pitfalls of manual migrations, the benefits of automated migrations, and getting started with Atlas to automate your database schema management.
