MySQL Data Compare can both compare the data in MYSQL databases and also synchronise them. It is handy for a number of tasks for which MySQL has no built-in tools. Although it is intuitive to use and has online help, there has never been a manual; until now!
In the previous article, you saw how MySQL Compare made it quite easy to keep track of your changes and keep your databases synchronized. That is crucial when you need to ensure that the schema changes you make in development propagate to test, staging, and production systems. Also important, though, is the ability to synchronize data. Needs vary in this regard. You may want to propagate small lookup tables directly from development through to production. With typical production data, though, you will typically only use a very small portion in development and test so you only need to synchronize a subset of your data. Or perhaps you are doing a system changeover, as was the case for one organization I worked with, where you really do want to synchronize large data tables. Regardless of your particular scenario, the task of data synchronization is essentially the same and MySQL Data Compare makes this as easy to do for your data as MySQL Compare did for your schemas.
