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Flow Commands

The purpose of the flow commands is to run flow files, which are modular, platform-independent ways to run a series of Liquibase commands in one or more stages. Flows allow you to run commands in a particular sequence according to conditional statements you specify.

For information about flow files, see Liquibase Flow Files.

Flow Category

These commands are available in all Liquibase editions.

  • flow: lets you run a series of commands contained in one or more stages within a Liquibase flow file.
  • flow validate: lets you validate a series of commands contained in one or more stages within a Liquibaseflow file.

Each individual flow command page specifies the criteria for using the command successfully, including a list of required and optional command-specific arguments.

Flow Command Requirements

  • The flow and flow validate commands require the liquibase-commercial.jar file to be located in the /liquibase/internal/lib folder to work.
  • Using the flow commands requires Liquibase version 4.15.0 or later.

Troubleshooting

  • Visit the Liquibase Installation Troubleshooting documentation page for troubleshooting steps.

  • If Liquibase returns an error when you run a flow command, use the Liquibase --help parameter to check the correct syntax of the command and the command-specific parameters you can use with it.

    For example, in the CLI: 

    liquibase <command> --help

Liquibase Resources

Liquibase Help

Visit the Liquibase Forum channel to ask questions, find answers from other Liquibase users, and learn about new Liquibase version releases.

Tutorials

  • Visit the Liquibase Flow Files page to learn how to configure and use flow files.
  • Visit the Flow Conditionals page to learn how to specify conditional expressions within flows.
  • Visit the Flow Variables page to learn how to specify dynamic variables within flows.
  • Visit the Shell Commands page to learn how to access your command line shell from a Liquibase flow file.
  • Visit the Advanced Flow File page to see examples of flow files with many features used simultaneously.