WHITEPAPER: Redgate SQL Source Control vs SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT)

The Agile, Continuous Delivery and DevOps movements have taught software development teams the importance of mature source control and release automation processes and their relevance to time to market, innovation, quality, reliability, efficiency and,ultimately, business success.

These lessons have been reinforced by the annual Puppet State of DevOps reports, which in 2018 specifically called out the database as being a key differentiator between high performers and low performers.

“Shifting left is about bringing more teams into the development and delivery process — for example, quality, security, database, audit and networking. Most teams begin the leftward shift by addressing deployment pain, which is the functional boundary between Dev and Ops.”

2018 State of DevOps Report

There are two strategies for database source control and deployment: “model”/“state” and “migrations”. Each has pros and cons. You can read more about the two approaches here:

workingwithdevs.com/delivering-databases-migrations-vs-state

DevOps is about people first and tooling second. However, whichever approach you decide to use, and especially if you choose the model approach, the right tooling can help.

Microsoft Data Platform MVP, Alex Yates, has extensive experience in the field of database DevOps using both the model- and the migration-based approach and a wide variety of tools. In this whitepaper here views the relative strengths and weaknesses of North America and Europe’s two most trusted model-based source control and deployment tools for SQL Server databases:

Redgate SQL Source Control and Microsoft SQL Server Data Tools.