PDCSC - Puya Data Changeset Creator

License

This tool is licensed under MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Introduction

@puya/pdcsc is a cli tool developed in nodejs that manages database scripts, generates changesets based on .sql file changes in repository, and provides automatic testing and executing of changesets.

Also, it can be used in CICD environments, like gitlab pipeline to automatically update a master database upon merging a feature branch to master branch.

Last but not least, it can be used manually to execute all changesets on a custom database, making the database up-to-date with the lastest changes.

Features

• Generate Changeset: generates changeset based on committed changes detected in a branch.
• Test Changeset: creates a database backup and executes the changeset against that to see whether the changeset is ok or not.
• Pipeline Mode: Using pipeline argument, it can be used in ci/cd pipelines (like gitlab or azuredevops) to provide a safe merge, preventing the merge if the changeset has errors.
• Update database: Using apply argument, it can apply changesets(s) on a database and making the database up-to-date.

By default (withought specifying pipeline or apply arguments), @puya/pdcsc manages current branch's changeset.

Installation

Global

npm i @puya/pdcsc -g

Local

npm install @puya/pdcsc

Current Version

2.1.26

Usage

Once installed, you can use the pdcsc command in your terminal. You should run this tool only in the root of your database's scripts repository.

pdcsc [cmd] [arguments] [options]

Main commands

• init: Initializes a new database repository in current path, creates a git repo in it (if no git repo found), creates default scripts folders and creates a pdcsc-config.json config file and gitlab ci/cd yaml file.
• roll: Creates/Updates a changeset based on .sql changes in current branch in ./Scripts folder. This is the default command.
• apply: Applies all changesets in ./Changes folder on a database (updates the database).
• pipeline: Used in CICD pipelines, tests changeset of current branch that its merge is requested and if it succeeds, executes changeset over the database specified (making it up-to-date).
• render: Renders a changeset and creates a .sql file for that (overwrites existing .sql file, but does not commit it)
• check-update: checks whether a new version for pdcsc is available or not.

CLI arguments

• -v or --version: Shows pdcsc version.
• -? or --help: Shows pdcsc help.
• -c or --config: specifying custom config file
• -s or --server: database server address.
• -u or --user: database user.
• -p or --password: database password.
• -d or --database: target database.
• -e or --encrypt: encrypt database connection or not (default is false).
• -dbm or --debug-mode: debug mode
• -dbl or --debug-level: debug level (1: simple, 2: advanced, 3: details, 4: deep details)

Note: -s, -u, -p, -d and -e cli args have more priority over same database settings in pdcsc-config.json config.

Examples

1. Initializing a new database repository:

pdcsc -init

Initializing a new database repository with full config:

pdcsc -init -f

2. Creating/Updating current feature branch's changeset:

pdcsc roll

or simply ...

pdcsc

3. Updating master database upon merge requests in CI/CD:

pdcsc pipeline

4. Manually updating an existing database

pdcsc apply -d MyDb

5. Specifying database setting through cli:

pdcsc -s "192.168.10.120" -u "myUser" -p "myPassword" -d "MyDb"

As it was stated, database settings specified through cli have more priority over config file.

Configuration

The behavior of pdcsc can be customized through its config file.

The config file is named pdcsc-config.json file. It is automatically created upon initializing a new pdcsc repository using -init command. The file is placed at the root of the repo.

Here's an example of a simple pdcsc configuration file:

{
  "database": {
    "server": "localhost",
    "user": "db_user",
    "password": "db_password",
    "database": "my_database",
    "encrypt": false
  },
  "pipeline": "gitlabs",
  "masterBranchName": "origin/main"
}

Config Description

The full pdcsc config file with all its options is as follows:

{
    "database": {
        "server": "...",	  // database server address (default = 'localhost')
        "user": "...",		  // database userid
        "password": "...",	// database password
        "database": "...",	  // master database name
        "encrypt": "..."	  // encrypt connection or not
    },
    "pipeline": "...",			    // pipeline type (gitlabs = default, azuredevops)
    "masterBranchName": "...",		// master branch name (default = 'origin/main')
    "appVersionSprocName": "..."	// appVersion sp name (default = 'dbo.getAppVersion')
    "appVersionFormat": "...",		// app version timestamp (default = 'YYYY-MM-DD HH:mm:ss')
    "timestampLocale": "...",		// timestamp locale (default = 'en')
    "changesetsTableName": "...",	// database changeset history table (default = 'dbo.Changesets')
    "backupDbName": "...",			// name of temp database when testing changesets (default = 'TempBackupDB')
    "defaultCodePage": "",			// default .sql files codepage (default = 'utf-8')
    "paths": {
        "backupDir": "...",				// default backup dir on database server (default = 'C:\\temp\\')
        "changesetFolderName": "...",	// changesets folder name (default = 'Changes')
        "scriptsFolderName": "...",		// .sql scripts folder name (default = 'Scripts')
    },
    "folders": {
        "procedures": "...",	// name of procedures folder (default = 'Procedures')
        "functions": "...",	// name of user-defined functions folder (default = 'Functions')
        "tables": "...",		// name of tables folder (default = 'Tables')
        "relations": "...",	// name of relations folder (default = 'Relations')
        "types": "...",		// name of user-defined types folder (default = 'Types')
        "views": "...",		// name of views folder (default = 'Views')
        "indexes": "...",	// name of indexes folder (default = 'Indexes')
        "triggers": "...",	// name of triggers folder (default = 'Triggers')
        "schemas": "..."		// name of schemas folder (default = 'Schemas')
    }
}

Config customization

We can customize pdcsc configuration using an environment variable named PDCSC_CONFIG_MODE.

If pdcsc detects such envionment variable, it checks whether a pdcsc-config.{env.PDCSC_CONFIG_MODE}.config file exists or not. If so, it merges that file with pdcsc-config.json file.

This, enables us to customize master branch name or database name based on env or store sensitive data such as database password in a customized pdcsc config file.

In the second usage, we can then add pdcsc-config.{env.PDCSC_CONFIG_MODE}.json in the .gitignore, so that the database password is not stored in the repository.

Using pdcsc in gitlab CI/CD pipeline

In GitLab, we can create a custom CI/CD pipeline, and use pdcsc in it with pipeline argument to ensure our database is updated automatically whenever a feature branche is merged.

Here is a sample gitlab pipeline:

stages:
  - build

variables:
  GIT_DEPTH: 0

before_merge_build:
  stage: build
  image: node:alpine
  script:
    - echo "Installing dependencies..."
    - apk update && apk add git
    - npm i @puya/pdcsc -g
    - |
      if [ "$CI_MERGE_REQUEST_SOURCE_BRANCH_NAME" = "dev" ]; then
        echo "updating database ..."
        node index.js apply -c "pdcsc-config-${CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME}.json" -dbm -f
      else
        echo "checking branch changeset before merge ..."
        node index.js pipeline -c "pdcsc-config-${CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME}.json" -dbm
      fi
  rules:
    - when: manual`

Notes:

• Here, we assumed we have one stage branch, named dev.
• We merge our feature branches to dev, not main.
• The dev branch is our development stage where incomplete features are pushed and tested.
• This way, we do not push incomplete/not-tested features directly to main branch.
• Whenever we are ok with our dev, we merge it to main branch (bringing features to production).
• Upon merging dev to main, previous features are already merged into dev, there is no need to use pipeline switch.
• We use apply switch instead and update master database (apply changeset files from dev upon master database).
• In our pipeline, we explicitly specify config file for pdcsc through -c switch.
• Name of the config file depends on the source branch that is going to be merged.
• If it is dev, we are merging dev into main.
• So, target branch (CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME) should be main. We specify a config file named pdcsc-config-{CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME}.json which would be pdcsc-config-main.json. So, the master database will be updated.
• If the source branch is not dev, we are mereging a feature branch.
• So, we our target branch is dev.
• This time, the config file pdcsc-config-{CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME}.json would be pdcsc-config-dev.json.
• So, the development database will be updated.

Note that, we should have pdcsc-config-dev.json and pdcsc-config-main.json files in our repo.

pdcsc-config-dev.json

{
  "database": {
    "database": "MyDb_dev"
  },
  "masterBranchName": "origin/dev"
}

pdcsc-config-main.json

{
  "database": {
    "database": "MyDb_main"
  },
  "masterBranchName": "origin/main"
}

Speed-up pipeline

We can create a Docker container, install Node.js and Git in it, so that these steps are not executed over and over again. This can speed up pipeline execution.

stages:
  - build

variables:
  GIT_DEPTH: 0
  DOCKER_REGISTRY: "our-node-and-git-docker-address:port"

before_merge_build:
  stage: build
  image: "${DOCKER_REGISTRY}/our-docker-registry/node-git"
  script:
    ...

Manually updating a database

Using apply argument we can execute all changesets against a database and update it with the latest changes we have.

pdcsc apply -d MyDb

Changeset execution history

pdcsc uses a table named dbo.Changesets in databases in order to save history of executed changesets.

After a changeset executes successfully, pdcsc inserts its name into dbo.Changesets table. This is called journaling.

Before pdcsc executes a changeset on a database, it checks dbo.Changesets table to see whether the changeset is already executed or not.

If such table does not exist, it shows and error and exits.

Using -f or --force cli argument, we can ask pdcsc to create such table if it does not exits.

pdcsc apply -d MyDb

Output:

Journal table dbo.Changesets not found. Use -f or --force to create journal table.

pdcsc apply -d MyDb -f

This behavior (manually use -f or force mode) is intentional in order to avoid updating an old database that is far behind our changesets and other updates should be applied on that before hand.

The name of journal table can be customized in pdcsc config file through changesetsTableName prop.

Update mode

The apply command has 3 modes which can be customized through -m argument:

• Test: test changesets against a backup of the database. This is useful when we want to make sure whether changesets will work correctly on the database or not.
• TestAndUpdate (default): test changesets first and if they were ok, update database.
• Update: execute changesets directly against the database.

Ideally, we should use a TestAndUpdate mode as it is the default mode. However, if we are completely sure about our changesets or the test phase takes a long time due (database is very large or under heavy load and backup/restore will take a long time), we can directly execute them on the database.

Example: only test changesets on a backup of database, not directly on database.

pdcsc apply -d MyDb -m Test

Example: apply changesets directly on database, do not test them beforehand.

pdcsc apply -d MyDb -m Update

Test changesets one by one

By default, pdcsc apply creates a bundle out of changesets and executes the bundle against a database backup.

Using -11 or --one-by-one cli argument we can ask pdcsc to test changesets one by one.

This can better highlight faulting changesets in case of errors.

pdcsc apply -d MyDb -11

Manually render a changeset

By default pdcsc renders or generates .sql file of a changeset when using roll command (default command).

Using render cli argument we can manually render a changeset.

Discussion

Manually rendering a changeset is not recommended and should be avoided at all costs. Rendering a changeset should ONLY and ONLY be done exactly in the branch it was created at.

If you render a changeset in another branch, the generated .sql may not be correct, may not be even generated and may not work or may lead to unwanted errors, bugs and disasters at worst case.

Suppose we are in branch feature/fix-product-update and we fix a sproc named usp_Product_update.

We generate a changeset, make a PR and the Team Lead in our company who performs code reviews merges the branch.

Now, if we switch to branch feature/create-reports and we have not pulled our main branch to receive the changes, if we intend to render the changeset of feature/fix-product-update branch, the .sql file being generated definitely is not correct, since we are creating usp_Product_update sproc using the copy in our own branch which is not up-to-date.

That is why, it is never recommended to manually render a changeset and this should be done in scarse cases and performed only by DBAs who know what they are doing.

Usage

We can specify the changeset for which we intend to create .sql file using -cs cli argument.

pdcsc render -cs 20250412082457_b6775a321_feature-add-otp

The -cs argument is optional. If it is not specified, pdcsc shows list of all changesets found in ./Changes folder and asks to choose which one to render.