Using Liquibase with Microsoft SQL Server

Microsoft SQL Server (MSSQL) is a relational database management system. Microsoft SQL Server supports different editions and components that accommodate unique performance and depend on your specific requirements.

Note: For more information, see the Microsoft SQL Server documentation page.

You can also use:

• Amazon RDS for SQL Server
• Microsoft Azure SQL Database
• Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance
• SQL Server on Google Cloud

Verified database versions

Microsoft SQL Server

• 2022
• 2019
• 2017
• 2016
• 2014 (deprecated)

AWS RDS – Microsoft SQL Server

• 2019
• 2017
• 2016
• 2014 (deprecated)

Google Cloud SQL – MSSQL

• 2019

Microsoft Azure SQL Database, Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance

• Cloud

Prerequisites

1. Download and Install Liquibase on your machine.
2. Ensure Java is installed: Liquibase requires Java to run. If you used the Liquibase Installer, Java is included automatically. Otherwise, you must install Java manually.
3. If you use Liquibase Pro, or a Liquibase Pro extension, confirm that you have a valid license key. For more information, see How to Apply Your Liquibase Pro License Key

Install drivers

CLI users

To use Liquibase and Microsoft SQL Server, you need the JDBC driver JAR file (Maven download).

The latest version of Liquibase has a pre-installed driver for this database in the $LIQUIBASE_HOME/internal/lib directory, so you don't need to install it yourself.

Tip: $LIQUIBASE_HOME is an environment variable that points to the location of the directory where Liquibase is installed on your machine. You can set environment variables using your operating system's shell. The location of $LIQUIBASE_HOME will depend on where Liquibase was installed on your machine.

Maven users

To use Liquibase with Maven, include the driver JAR(s) as a dependency in your pom.xml file. Using this information, Maven automatically downloads the driver JAR from Maven Central when you build your project.

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.microsoft.sqlserver</groupId>
    <artifactId>mssql-jdbc</artifactId>
    <version>12.3.1.jre8</version>
</dependency>

Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance

If you use a Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance and want to authenticate using a Managed Identity Service Principal connection, you need several dependencies to connect to Liquibase.

In Liquibase 4.23.1+, you can install a single JAR file liquibase-azure-deps-4.32.0.jar containing all dependencies instead of installing each JAR manually. Go to the "Assets" section of the latest Liquibase release and download the JAR with your Liquibase version. Place your JAR file in the liquibase/lib directory.

For more information, see Connect using Azure Active Directory authentication.

Configure connection

1. Ensure your Microsoft SQL Server is configured. You can check the status by using one of a management tool or by running the ping command. Also, you can use the sqlcmd utility and run sqlcmd -SmyServer\instanceName.

Note: Replace myServer\instanceName with the name of the computer and the instance of SQL Server that you want to connect to.

2. Specify the database URL in the liquibase.properties file (defaults file), along with other properties you want to set a default value for. Liquibase does not parse the URL. You can either specify the full database connection string or specify the URL using your database's standard connection format:

url: jdbc:sqlserver://<host>:<port>;databaseName=<dbname>

Note: Depending on the configuration you use, your URL format may be different. For more information, see Building the Connection URL and Setting the connection properties.

Tip: To apply a Liquibase Pro key to your project, add the following property to the Liquibase properties file: licenseKey: <paste code here>

Test connection

1. Create a text file called changelog (.sql, .yaml, .json, or .xml) in your project directory and add a changeset.

   If you already created a changelog using the init project command, you can use that instead of creating a new file. When adding onto an existing changelog, be sure to only add the changeset and to not duplicate the changelog header.

• SQL example
• YAML example
• JSON example
• XML example

--liquibase formatted sql

--changeset your.name:1
CREATE TABLE test_table (test_id INT NOT NULL, test_column INT, PRIMARY KEY (test_id))

Tip: Formatted SQL changelogs generated from Liquibase versions before 4.2.0 might cause issues because of the lack of space after a double dash ( -- ). To fix this, add a space after the double dash. For example: -- liquibase formatted sql instead of --liquibase formatted sql and -- changeset myname:create-table instead of --changeset myname:create-table.

databaseChangeLog:
   - changeSet:
       id: 1
       author: your.name
       changes:
       - createTable:
           tableName: test_table
           columns:
           - column:
               name: test_id
               type: INT
               constraints:
                   primaryKey:  true
                   nullable:  false
           - column:
               name: test_column
               type: INT

{
  "databaseChangeLog": [
    {
      "changeSet": {
        "id": "1",
        "author": "your.name",
        "changes": [
          {
            "createTable": {
              "tableName": "test_table",
              "columns": [
                {
                  "column": {
                    "name": "test_id",
                    "type": "INT",
                    "constraints": {
                      "primaryKey": true,
                      "nullable": false
                    }
                  }
                },
                {
                  "column": {
                    "name": "test_column",
                    "type": "INT"
                  }
                }
              ]
            }
          }
        ]
      }
    }
  ]
}

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<databaseChangeLog
    xmlns="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xmlns:ext="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog-ext"
    xmlns:pro="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/pro"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog
        http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog/dbchangelog-latest.xsd
        http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog-ext
        http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/dbchangelog/dbchangelog-ext.xsd
        http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/pro
        http://www.liquibase.org/xml/ns/pro/liquibase-pro-latest.xsd">

    <changeSet id="1" author="your.name">
        <createTable tableName="test_table">
            <column name="test_id" type="int">
                <constraints primaryKey="true" nullable="false" />
            </column>
            <column name="test_column" type="int"/>
        </createTable>
    </changeSet>

</databaseChangeLog>

2. Navigate to your project folder in the CLI and run the Liquibase status command to see whether the connection is successful:

liquibase status --username=test --password=test --changelog-file=<changelog.xml>

Note: You can specify arguments in the CLI or keep them in the Liquibase properties file.

If your connection is successful, you'll see a message like this:

4 changesets have not been applied to <your_connection_url>
Liquibase command 'status' was executed successfully. 

3. Inspect the deployment SQL with the update-sql command:

liquibase update-sql --changelog-file=<changelog.xml>

If the SQL that Liquibase generates isn't what you expect, you should review your changelog file and make any necessary adjustments.

4. Then execute these changes to your database with the update command:

liquibase update --changelog-file=<changelog.xml>

If your update is successful, Liquibase runs each changeset and displays a summary message ending with:

Liquibase: Update has been successful.
Liquibase command 'update' was executed successfully.

5. From a database UI tool, ensure that your database contains the test_table object you added along with the DATABASECHANGELOG table and DATABASECHANGELOGLOCK table.

Now you're ready to start deploying database changes with Liquibase!

Related links

• Microsoft SQL Documentation
• Using Liquibase and MSSQL Server with Windows Integrated Security
• Use native executors with Microsoft SQL Server
• Change Types
• Concepts
• Liquibase Commands
• Workflows