Using Liquibase with Oracle Database

Oracle Database is an object-relational database that offers market-leading performance, scalability, reliability, and security, both on-premises and in the cloud. For more information, see the Oracle Database documentation page.

For information on Oracle Autonomous Database with Autonomous Transaction Processing and Autonomous Data Warehouse, see Using Liquibase with Oracle Autonomous Database with ATP & ADW.

Verified database versions

Oracle Database

• 23c
• 21c
• 19c
• 12.2

AWS RDS – Oracle Database

• 21c
• 19c

Prerequisites

1. Introduction to Liquibase: Dive into Liquibase concepts.
2. Install Liquibase: Download Liquibase on your machine.
3. 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.
4. Get Started with Liquibase: Learn how to use Liquibase with an example database.
5. Design Your Liquibase Project: Create a new Liquibase project folder and organize your changelogs.
6. How to Apply Your Liquibase Pro License Key: If you use Liquibase Pro, activate your license.

Install drivers

CLI users

To use Liquibase and Oracle Database, 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.oracle.database.jdbc</groupId>
    <artifactId>ojdbc8</artifactId>
    <version>21.5.0.0</version>
</dependency>

Configure connection

1. Ensure Oracle is configured
• Oracle Server
• Oracle on AWS RDS
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:
• Oracle Server
• Oracle on AWS RDS

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!

Oracle Server

• Check the status by using SRVCTL, SQL*Plus, or Oracle Enterprise Manager. Also, you can run the following query:

SELECT INSTANCE_NAME, STATUS, DATABASE_STATUS FROM V$INSTANCE;

• 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:oracle:thin:@<host>:<port>/<service_name>

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

Oracle on AWS RDS

Check the connection by using any standard SQL client application, including SQL*Plus, and running the following:

Linux, macOS, or Unix

sqlplus 'user_name@(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=dns_name)(PORT=port))(CONNECT_DATA=(SID=database_name)))'

Windows

sqlplus user_name@(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=dns_name)(PORT=port))(CONNECT_DATA=(SID=database_name)))

Note: user_name represents your DB instance administrator, and dns_name stands for your DB instance. Also, replace the port number and the Oracle SID with your values. The Oracle SID is the name of the DB instance's database that you specified when you created the DB instance.

Tip: The alternative way is to connect with Oracle SQL Developer.

You can find the connection information in the AWS Management Console:

1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the Amazon RDS console.
2. In the upper-right corner of the console, choose the AWS Region of your DB instance.
3. Find the DNS name and port number for your DB Instance:
   • Select Databases and choose the needed Oracle DB instance to display the instance details.
   • Select Connectivity & security. You will see all information under Endpoint & Port.

Note: To find the connection information using the AWS CLI, call the describe-db-instances command, as follows: aws rds describe-db-instances. In the output, you will see the Port line and the Address line containing the DNS name.

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:oracle:thin:@<endpoint>:<port>:<sid>

Example: url: jdbc:oracle:thin:@myrds.cz1j1vh9uvuo.us-east-1.rds.amazonaws.com:3306:orcl

Related links

• Oracle Database Documentation
• Connecting to your Oracle DB instance
• Use Native Executors with Oracle Database
• Using Liquibase and AWS RDS
• Change Types
• Concepts
• Liquibase Commands
• Workflows