Sql Server Compact - Schema Management
- by Richard B
I've been searching for some time for a good solution to implement the idea of managing schema on a Sql Server Compact 3.5 db.
I know of several ways of managing schema on Sql Express/std/enterprise, but Compact Edition doesn't support the necessary tools required to use the same methodology.
Any suggestions/tips?
I should expand this to say that it is for 100+ clients with wrapperware software. As the system changes, I need to publish update scripts alongside the new binaries to the client. I was looking for a decent method by which to publish this without having to just hand the client a script file and say "Run this in SSMSE". Most clients are not capable of doing such a beast.
A buddy of mine disclosed a partial script on how to handle the SQL Server piece of my task, but never worked on Compact Edition... It looks like I'll be on my own for this.
What I think that I've decided to do, and it's going to need a "geek week" to accomplish, is that I'm going to write some sort of tool much like how WiX and nAnt works, so that I can just write an overzealous Xml document to handle the work.
If I think that it is worthwhile, I'll publish it on CodePlex and/or CodeProject because I've used both sites a bit to gain better understanding of concepts for jobs I've done in the past, and I think it is probably worthwhile to give back a little.