How to Stop SSDT / Database Projects / SQLPackage from Modifying Database Options

SQL Server’s free state-based version control tooling was introduced under the ‘Data Dude’ brand, then became known as ‘SQL Server Data Tools’ (SSDT). Its extension for the (now dying) Azure Data Studio IDE is called ‘SQL Database Projects’. If you need to find documentation, you often need to know to search for specific component names like SQLPackage.exe, which is a command line utility used to deploy SSDT Projects AKA SQL Database Projects.

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Managing Drift in Automated Deployments to SQL Server Databases

One big gotcha that teams often encounter when automating deployments for databases is that it’s difficult (or sometimes impossible) to ensure that all changes to the production database are performed through the automation pipeline.

These out-of-band changes case the production database to “drift” away from the schema as defined in version control.

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SQL Change Automation, Visual Studio, and the Unknown SQL Server Platform Error

I recently set up Redgate’s SQL Change Automation in Visual Studio 2017, and I ran into a confusing error when I started trying to use it. For any other folks out there searching on “Unknown SQL Server Platform,” here’s how I got past it.

Spoiler: Visual Studio suggested updating Microsoft’s SQL Server Data Tools, which failed for me and wasted a lot of time. Updating Visual Studio did fix my issue.

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