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Deploy to Oracle with drm-cli + Flyway: A Step-by-Step Guide

#database #devops #oracle #opensource

Oracle deployments have a reputation. They're slow to set up, painful to automate, and the tooling ecosystem tends to assume you have deep pockets. If you've tried to build a reliable Oracle deployment pipeline, you've probably hit at least one of these walls:

  • No consistent audit trail of what was deployed, when, and whether it succeeded
  • Pre/post deployment steps scattered across runbooks and tribal knowledge
  • Connection strings with credentials in environment files and CI/CD config
  • Multi-schema releases stitched together with shell scripts

drm-cli layers on top of Flyway or Liquibase — adding release tracking, encrypted credentials, retry logic, and pre/post deployment scripting. It's free and open-source, which means Oracle-grade deployment management without an extra licensing cost on the tooling layer.

This tutorial walks through a complete Oracle deployment using drm-cli + Flyway.

Prerequisites

Before you start, you'll need:

  • Python 3.7+ installed on the host running drm-cli
  • git to clone the repo
  • Flyway installed and on your PATH — download here
  • Oracle JDBC driver (ojdbc11.jar) — available from Oracle's driver download page
  • An Oracle database you can connect to (Oracle XE works fine for testing)

Step 1 — Install drm-cli

Clone the repository and run the installer:

git clone https://github.com/dband-drm/drm-cli.git
cd drm-cli
python3 ./install.py
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The installer is interactive — it will prompt you for:

  • Installation path — where drm-cli will be installed (defaults to your home directory)
  • Encryption key — to encrypt sensitive data like connection strings at rest (optional but recommended)
  • Storage type — json (file-based, no extra dependencies) or sqlite

For a non-interactive install:

python3 ./install.py -d json -p none
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(-p none means no encryption — use only for local test environments)

Once complete:

INFO - DRM installation finished successfully!!!
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Step 2 — Prepare Your Flyway Migrations

drm-cli works with your existing Flyway migration scripts. Standard Flyway naming conventions apply — nothing needs to change:

my-oracle-migrations/
├── V1__create_accounts_table.sql
├── V2__add_account_status.sql
└── V3__create_transactions_table.sql
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Example migrations:

-- V1__create_accounts_table.sql
CREATE TABLE accounts (
    account_id   NUMBER GENERATED ALWAYS AS IDENTITY PRIMARY KEY,
    account_name VARCHAR2(100) NOT NULL,
    created_at   TIMESTAMP DEFAULT SYSTIMESTAMP
);
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-- V2__add_account_status.sql
ALTER TABLE accounts
ADD status VARCHAR2(20) DEFAULT 'ACTIVE';
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Note the path to this directory — you'll need it in the next step.

Step 3 — Configure Your Release

drm-cli stores all release configuration in a central database. Depending on the storage type you chose at install, this is either drm_db.json or drm_db.sqlite inside the db/ folder in your drm-cli installation directory.

JSON style

Open <install-path>/db/drm_db.json in any editor. Find the releases array and add your release with a solution and connection:

{
  "id": 10,
  "name": "oracle-release-v1",
  "solutions": [
    {
      "name": "core-schema-flyway",
      "solution_type_id": 3,
      "path": "/path/to/my-oracle-migrations",
      "connections": [
        {
          "name": "oracle-prod",
          "connection_type_id": 2,
          "connection_string": "url=jdbc:oracle:thin:@//127.0.0.1:1521/XEPDB1;username=deploy_user;password=your-password;"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}
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Key fields:

  • solution_type_id: 3 — Flyway (use 2 for Liquibase)
  • path — the directory containing your Flyway migration scripts
  • connection_type_id: 2 — Oracle
  • connection_string — the JDBC connection string Flyway uses

SQLite style

Insert via SQL:

-- Add the release
INSERT INTO releases (id, name) VALUES (10, 'oracle-release-v1');

-- Add the Flyway solution
INSERT INTO solutions (id, name, release_id, ordinal, solution_type_id, path)
VALUES (100, 'core-schema-flyway', 10, 1, 3, '/path/to/my-oracle-migrations');

-- Add the Oracle connection
INSERT INTO connections (id, name, solution_id, connection_type_id, connection_string)
VALUES (1001, 'oracle-prod', 100, 2,
        'url=jdbc:oracle:thin:@//127.0.0.1:1521/XEPDB1;username=deploy_user;password=your-password;');
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Step 4 — Run Your First Deployment

Navigate to your drm-cli installation directory and run:

python3 ./drm_deploy.py -c oracle-prod -r 10 --deploy
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Parameters:

  • -c oracle-prod — the connection name you defined in the config
  • -r 10 — the release ID
  • --deploy — execute the deployment (use --dryrun to generate scripts without running them)

You'll see output as drm-cli invokes Flyway, captures the result, and records it:

INFO - DRM Deploy started
INFO - Running solution: core-schema-flyway
INFO - Executing Flyway migrate...
INFO - Flyway: Successfully applied 3 migrations to schema "DEPLOY_USER"
INFO - Deployment recorded successfully
INFO - DRM Deploy finished successfully!!!
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That last line is what makes drm-cli different from running Flyway directly. Every deployment is written to the release history — timestamp, connection, release ID, outcome.

Step 5 — View Deployment History

After a deployment runs, drm-cli records the full event.

JSON style

Browse to <install-path>/deployments/. Each deployment creates a log file named:

Deploy_{GUID}_C{connection-name}_R{release-id}.json
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Open it to see the full deployment record: every step, its start/end time, status, and any error messages. This audit trail lives entirely in your own infrastructure — no cloud service, no external dependency.

SQLite style

Query the deployments table:

SELECT d.*, ds.name AS status
FROM deployments AS d
INNER JOIN deployment_statuses AS ds ON ds.id = d.deployment_status_id
ORDER BY d.start_time DESC
LIMIT 10;
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Step 6 — What Happens When a Migration Fails

If your network connection to Oracle drops mid-deployment, drm-cli retries automatically. Retry behavior is configured in drm_deploy.config inside your drm-cli installation:

"retry_attempts": 3,
"retry_delay_seconds": 10
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With this config, a failed step will retry up to 3 times with a 10-second delay. If all retries are exhausted, the deployment is marked failed and the full error is recorded in the deployment log — so you know exactly what ran, what didn't, and when.

Step 7 — Encrypting Your Oracle Credentials

Storing plaintext connection strings is a habit worth breaking. If you installed drm-cli with an encryption key, use drm_crypto.py to encrypt your connection string:

python3 ./drm_crypto.py
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The utility prompts you for your encryption key and the value to encrypt, then returns the encrypted string. Replace the plaintext value in your connection config with the result:

"connection_string": "url=jdbc:oracle:thin:@//127.0.0.1:1521/XEPDB1;username=deploy_user;password=ENCRYPTED_VALUE_HERE;"
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drm-cli decrypts credentials at deploy time — they never appear in logs or trace output.

Using Liquibase Instead of Flyway

Swap solution_type_id: 3 for solution_type_id: 2 and set path to your Liquibase changelog directory. The connection config is identical:

{
  "name": "core-schema-liquibase",
  "solution_type_id": 2,
  "path": "/path/to/liquibase/changelogs",
  "connections": [
    {
      "name": "oracle-prod",
      "connection_type_id": 2,
      "connection_string": "url=jdbc:oracle:thin:@//127.0.0.1:1521/XEPDB1;username=deploy_user;password=your-password;"
    }
  ]
}
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The deployment command is identical:

python3 ./drm_deploy.py -c oracle-prod -r 10 --deploy
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What's Next

  • Week 6 — Pre/post deployment scripts: automating steps that always run before and after every deployment
  • Week 7 — Multi-database releases: SQL Server, PostgreSQL, and Oracle in a single coordinated release

The full source and documentation is at github.com/dband-drm/drm-cli. Open issues there if you hit anything unexpected.

drm-cli is free and open-source. No license tiers, no paid features.

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