Matt Hilbert

17 October 2022

Three Years in the Making: Redgate Launches Enterprise Version of Popular Open Source Migrations Tool, Flyway

Redgate Software announced today the launch of Flyway Enterprise, a feature-rich version of Flyway which enables organizations to standardize and automate database deployments across teams and database technologies, increasing both their frequency and reliability.

Redgate acquired Flyway, the open source migrations tool, in July of 2019 and committed to developing it further and keeping the Flyway Community version free while also improving upon the paid-for version, Flyway Teams, and introducing a more advanced Enterprise edition.

A new version of Flyway Teams was launched shortly after to improve collaboration within teams and fine tune their processes during the development and deployment of database changes across 20+ different databases. Flyway Enterprise completes the picture and is aimed at enterprises who require secure and automated processes with compliance control to develop, test and deploy database changes.

It now enables them to benefit from database versioning, testing and automation, together with the agile and fast provisioning of database copies for use in development. With the latest Stack Overflow Developer Survey showing developers moving towards a more even split between operating systems, care has been taken to ensure Flyway’s command line runs natively on MacOS and Linux as well as Windows. Other environments are also supported, such as invoking it via a Docker container, or integrating it with other build tools like Maven or Gradle, as well as package managers, release management tools and IDEs.

To help developers get up and running with Flyway easier and faster, Flyway Desktop, a new user interface for authoring and understanding databases changes has been introduced across all versions of Flyway, including the Community version. Available for Windows or macOS, it allows users to version control their database objects and generate migrations for full control over how database changes are deployed.

As David Bick, Head of Product Management at Redgate, comments: “Our aim was to help enterprises simplify, standardize and automate their database development processes while also continuing our ongoing support for Community and Team users.”

The launch of Flyway Enterprise was prompted by the big rise in the different types of data enterprises now want to store, the volume of information they need to handle, and the hugely varying needs around data collection and querying. No one database does all of these things best, and enterprises are now faced with a lot of databases systems.

This specialisation is reinforced by an accompanying shift to microservices architecture, where enterprises no longer need a single database to support many types of data and access, but can instead pair the most appropriate database with the microservice it enables.

This is also reflected in the Stack Overflow Developer Survey, which showed that developers are now working against more than one database, with PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQLite, Microsoft SQL Server and MongoDB taking the top five spots. Redgate’s 2021 State of Database DevOps report supports this, showing that 78% of enterprises have multiple database systems in use.

Flyway Enterprise meets these growing needs by improving the reliability and efficiency of database deployments across database technologies, removing database bottlenecks by enabling agile development practices, reducing the risk of data loss and breaches, and integrating with existing tech stacks and processes.

As David Bick concludes: “Our ambition is to make Flyway Enterprise work for every business or organization, no matter which databases they’re using, whether they’re deployed on-premises or in the cloud, and on whatever OS their developers prefer. One set of tools they can standardize on, regardless of the variety of the platforms they’re working with.”

More information about Flyway is available at redgate.com/flyway.

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