This level examines how a rehearsed changeset is transformed into production-ready deployment artifacts. By consolidating scripts into controlled execution units and validating the resulting artifacts, the approach ensures that production deployment remains predictable and aligned with what was proven during rehearsal.
2026-06-11 (first published: 2026-06-10)
1,020 reads
After defining the deployment contract in the previous level, this article focuses on validating a changeset before it reaches production. Rehearsal across environments ensures that execution order, rollback behavior, and baseline alignment all behave exactly as expected.
2026-06-11 (first published: 2026-05-20)
632 reads
Level 2 formalizes the behavioral guarantees that a changeset must provide in order to be safely deployed and rolled back. It introduces the deployment contract, checkpoint semantics, and the structural scope of Create and Rollback scripts. Data changes are addressed through a dedicated Update mechanism, with clear boundaries and limitations. By the end of this level, a changeset becomes a predictable and well-defined unit that can be reasoned about independently of execution context.
2026-06-11 (first published: 2026-05-06)
1,126 reads
This stairway addresses many of the issues that come about with ad hoc database deployment processes in many organizations. You will learn how to better architect and structure your processes to ensure a reliable database deployment for your applications.
2026-06-11 (first published: 2026-04-15)
199 reads
Stairway to Reliable Database Deployments introduces a progressive approach to managing database changes with clear intent, predictable rollback, and explicit behavioral guarantees. Starting from change design and moving toward execution and coordination in complex environments, the Stairway provides a conceptual framework for deploying database changes safely and consistently, independent of specific tools or automation platforms.
2026-06-11 (first published: 2026-04-15)
1,696 reads
Today Steve talks about the concept of what a failure is when deploying changes.
2025-06-13
80 reads
This guide will walk you through the process of deploy DACPAC to Azure SQL database directly from Visual Studio.
2025-03-10
1,767 reads
If you build software for customers, you have a pipeline. It might not be good, but you have one. Steve recommends you work to make sure this is a repeatable, reliable pipeline.
2023-10-13
126 reads
You’ve got an existing application with a database back end. You’re thinking about changing the database, and you don’t wanna break stuff.
2023-07-28
You want to use SQL Compare or SQL Change Automation (SCA) to create or update a database, and at the same time ensure that its data is as you expect. You want to avoid running any additional PowerShell scripting every time you do it, and you want to keep everything in source control, including the data. You just want to keep everything simple. Phil Factor demonstrates how it's done, by generating MERGE scripts from a stored procedure.
2019-12-13
By Steve Jones
I wrote about learning today for the editorial: I Can’t Make You Learn. I...
By ReviewMyDB
Fabric has CI/CD built in, but if you've tried to use it for database...
By Steve Jones
attriage – n. the state of having lost all control over how you feel...
Comments posted to this topic are about the item SSRS Reminded Me of the...
I have a need to execute a stored procedure and return the results to...
Title pretty much says it all - can this be done? I've tried several...
In SQL Server 2025, I have a table (dbo.UserPermission) that contains this data:
UserID UserPermissions 15 23 37 4 NULLWhat is returned when I run this code:
select bit_count(UserPermissions) as PermissionCount from dbo.UserPermission where UserID = 4;See possible answers