Refinery

What Refinery is

Refinery is a free, MIT-licensed SQL migration toolkit for Rust applications. It runs migrations against a database connection provided by the application. Migrations can be embedded in Rust code or run with the refinery_cli command-line tool, and can be written as SQL files or Rust modules whose migration function returns a String. Refinery records applied migration versions and metadata, then checks for missing or divergent migrations before running unapplied work. By default, each migration runs in its own transaction; grouped mode can place all migrations in one transaction. Migrations can also be built into a binary, so separate migration files are not needed at deployment. Listed drivers include postgres, tokio-postgres, mysql, mysql_async, rusqlite, and tiberius. SQLx can be used with a Config that implements Migrate. Driver selection is handled through features. Refinery supports Linux, macOS, and Windows, and can be self-hosted. To undo a migration, users must create a new migration containing the reversing changes. The project aims to support stable Rust, the previous Rust version, and nightly.

Who it suits

Refinery suits Rust developers who want to manage SQL migrations through application code or a command-line tool. It supports several listed database drivers and self-hosted use.

Limits

Migration versions default to signed 32-bit integers; 64-bit versions require the int8-versions feature to be enabled before using the database. Reversing a migration requires a new migration with the reversing changes.

Getting started

1. Open the public GitHub project at https://github.com/rust-db/refinery.
2. Select the database driver feature needed by the project.
3. Choose SQL files or Rust modules for migration content.
4. Run migrations through Rust code or the refinery_cli command-line tool.
5. Optionally embed migrations in the application binary for deployment.

Verdict

Refinery offers Rust projects migration tracking, transaction handling, and embedded or command-line execution. Plan for rollback by writing a new migration, and check driver support and version settings for your setup.