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> Also check out [ReshapeDB](https://reshapedb.com), a new database built from the ground up to make zero-downtime schema and data migrations as simple and safe as possible. If you'd like to chat about it, please [reach out](contact@reshapedb.com)!
Reshape is an easy-to-use, zero-downtime schema migration tool for Postgres. It automatically handles complex migrations that would normally require downtime or manual multi-step changes. During a migration, Reshape ensures both the old and new schema are available at the same time, allowing you to gradually roll out your application. It will also perform all changes without excessive locking, avoiding downtime caused by blocking other queries. For a more thorough introduction to Reshape, check out the [introductory blog post](https://fabianlindfors.se/blog/schema-migrations-in-postgres-using-reshape/).
Reshape works by creating views that encapsulate the underlying tables, which your application will interact with. During a migration, Reshape will automatically create a new set of views and set up triggers to translate inserts and updates between the old and new schema. This means that every deployment is a three-phase process:
2.**Roll out application**: Your application can be gradually rolled out without downtime. The existing deployment will continue using the old schema whilst the new deployment uses the new schema.
If the application deployment fails, you should run `reshape migration abort` which will roll back any changes made by `reshape migration start` without losing data.
Each migration should be stored as a separate file in a `migrations/` directory. The files can be in either JSON or TOML format and the name of the file will become the name of your migration. We recommend prefixing every migration with an incrementing number as migrations are sorted by file name.
Let's create a simple migration to set up a new table `users` with two fields, `id` and `name`. We'll create a file called `migrations/1_create_users_table.toml`:
Reshape relies on your application using a specific schema. When establishing the connection to Postgres in your application, you need to run a query to select the most recent schema. The simplest way to do this is to use one of the helper libraries:
If your application is not using one of the languages with an available helper library, you can instead generate the query with the command: `reshape schema-query`. To pass it along to your application, you can for example use an environment variable in your run script: `RESHAPE_SCHEMA_QUERY=$(reshape schema-query)`. Then in your application:
We use the `--complete` flag to automatically complete the migration. During a production deployment, you should first run `reshape migration start` followed by `reshape migration complete` once your application has been fully rolled out.
If nothing else is specified, Reshape will try to connect to a Postgres database running on `localhost` using `postgres` as both username and password. See [Connection options](#connection-options) for details on how to change the connection settings.
When adding new migrations during development, we recommend running `reshape migration start` but skipping `reshape migration complete`. This way, the new migrations can be iterated on by updating the migration file and running `reshape migration abort` followed by `reshape migration start`.
Every migration consists of one or more actions. The actions will be run sequentially. Here's an example of a migration with two actions to create two tables, `customers` and `products`:
The `create_table` action will create a new table with the specified columns, indices and constraints. You can optionally provide an `up` option to backfill values from an existing table.
The `add_foreign_key` action will add a foreign key between two existing tables. The migration will fail if the existing column values aren't valid references.
The `remove_foreign_key` action will remove an existing foreign key. The foreign key will only be removed once the migration is completed, which means that your new application must continue to adhere to the foreign key constraint.
The `add_column` action will add a new column to an existing table. You can optionally provide an `up` setting. This should be an SQL expression which will be run for all existing rows to backfill the new column. `up` may also reference another table to perform cross-table migrations (see ["Complex changes across tables"](#complex-changes-across-tables)).
When performing more complex changes than a rename, `up` and `down` should be provided. These should be SQL expressions which determine how to transform between the new and old version of the column. Inside those expressions, you can reference the current column value by the column name.
The `remove_column` action will remove an existing column from a table. You can optionally provide a `down` setting. This should be an SQL expression which will be used to determine values for the old schema when inserting or updating rows using the new schema. `down` may also reference another table to perform cross-table migrations (see ["Complex changes across tables"](#complex-changes-across-tables)) . The `down` setting must be provided when the removed column is `NOT NULL` or doesn't have a default value.
The `remove_enum` action will remove an existing [enum type](https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/datatype-enum.html). Make sure all usages of the enum has been removed before running the migration. The enum will only be removed once the migration is completed.
The `custom` action lets you create a migration which runs custom SQL. It should be used with great care as it provides no guarantees of zero-downtime and will simply run whatever SQL is provided. Use other actions whenever possible as they are explicitly designed for zero downtime.
There are three optional settings available which all accept SQL queries. All queries need to be idempotent, for example by using `IF NOT EXISTS` wherever available.
The `up` and `down` options available when creating tables, adding columns and removing columns can also perform more complex changes that span tables.
Starts a new migration, applying all migrations under `migrations/` that haven't yet been applied. After the command has completed, both the old and new schema will be usable at the same time. When you have rolled out the new version of your application which uses the new schema, you should run `reshape migration complete`.
Generates the SQL query you need to run in your application before using the database. This command does not require a database connection. Instead it will generate the query based on the latest migration in the `migrations/` directory (or the directories specified by `--dirs`).
The options below can be used with all commands that communicate with Postgres. Use either a [connection URL](https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/libpq-connect.html#LIBPQ-CONNSTRING) or specify each connection option individually.
All options can also be set using environment variables instead of flags. If a `.env` file exists, then variables will be automatically loaded from there.
