How to save application configuration data to a database in multiple environments?

Question

The company I work with tried to save configuration data for our application in several environments, but synchronizing this data was always problematic, and we never had a good solution.

To help clarify, we (developers or business) could change some configuration using our admin interface in the Staging environment, test it, and then copy these changes to our production environment without having to repeat all the changes in the Production Environment. We also usually wanted to synchronize these changes between all our environments (dev, staging and production), again without the need to make changes to each environment.

Preferably, we don’t want to use low-level tools, as we ask the business to use something like RedGate SQL Data Compare and copy individual rows will fail. It should be something intuitive enough for non-technical specialists to use it, rather than suppress them.

How do we maintain this configuration data in different environments while keeping the business able to check their changes before applying it to a live environment?

Answer 1

What level of technical know-how will users have? As a product manager at Red Gate, I can give you our perspective. Although we do not consider data support in our release of SQL Source Control (v1) version V1 (currently under development), this will inevitably follow. However, it will still require those who want to edit static data to do this in SSMS, although they could, of course, use value editing using SSMS graphic designers. Or is it even less intuitive than we would like? They will modify the data in the developer’s or intermediate database and, as expected, will verify that the changes are correct and function as expected. Then they would be directed to control the source through our tool.

For deployment, we are talking about launching SQL Data Compare, although we plan to provide simple shortcuts from SSMS, instead of requiring users to coordinate their path around a completely different tool. We did not attach constructions for this functionality, so I would advise you to participate in our Early Access Program and indicate your case. More information about the Program can be found here:

http://www.red-gate.com/Products/SQL_Source_Control/index.htm