If you’ve ever worked with SQL Server or another database system, you’ve likely run into a situation where you need a way to sync changes from one database to another. If you develop with databases, you may want to do things like sync a dev database to a production database, and the ability to sync only certain objects and data could be very valuable, allowing you to selectively update parts of a database. I have looked at a lot of tools to help accomplish this, and there really aren’y many that are free especially, and few that perform this task well.
A tool that I just started using and have already fallen in love with is SQL Delta. It has a friendly, simple interface (which is weird in the IT world) that gets the job done with style, and makes things too easy to do. It is helpful, descriptive so there is little confusion, and has a bunch of tools that make the process cake.
You sign in to both databases from Delta, it compares everything (structure and data, though on different tabs) and tells you what differences there are between servers. It is literally the first-cousin of subversion or Visual Source Safe’s Diff tools, but it makes way more sense than that. I was able to sync 2 databases in minutes and it saved a project I was working on a lot of time and agony.
The single user license for Delta is $330 at present, which is nothing compared to the value it provides. They offer a 14 day trial — where everything seems to work as it would when purchased — as opposed to the trials that are “full featured” and only let you sync 4 records to “try it out” (ludicrously inadequate). They also have an Oracle version as well, which I haven’t tried but expect is just as good as the SQL version. This is for Windows only, but since you need windows to use SQL Server, it makes sense. If you’re looking for a database management tool to diff and sync all that juicy yummy data, consider this tool. It is a keeper.