Friday, April 29, 2016

How to compare 2 Sql Server Databases with VS 2015

Introduction

There are some times that you need to check your DB, either the data or schema. Sometimes you have a back up and you want to see what has been added updated or removed from your data, like when you have an error that you cannot find the cause.
Sometimes, you want to see if someone has changed the schema and you want to know what is the change.

Solution 
It is an old problem right? But in the old days you had to pay lots of money to be able to do that.
Take a look at Red Gate SQL data compare or SQL Data Examiner . Yup you have to pay at least 300$ to do that. :|
But the good news is that your Visual Studio has the ability to Do a lot of Data and Schema comparison which is free and more importantly it is inside our great tool Visual Studio. :)

How to do it?
Inside Visual Studio 2015 (mine is professional) Go to Tools >SQL Server. you will see 2 options for comparing Data, or Schema.



Insert your connection Data, click compare and you are good to go :)


17 comments: