ref/mysql
ref/mysql
Migrating a MySQL Database to PostgreSQL
This command instructs pgloader to load data from a database connection. pgloader supports dynamically converting the schema of the source database and the indexes building.
A default set of casting rules are provided and might be overloaded and appended to by the command.
Here’s an example using as many options as possible, some of them even being defaults. Chances are you don’t need that complex a setup, don’t copy and paste it, use it only as a reference!
LOAD DATABASE
FROM mysql://root@localhost/sakila
INTO postgresql://localhost:54393/sakila
WITH include drop, create tables, create indexes, reset sequences,
workers = 8, concurrency = 1,
multiple readers per thread, rows per range = 50000
SET PostgreSQL PARAMETERS
maintenance_work_mem to '128MB',
work_mem to '12MB',
search_path to 'sakila, public, "$user"'
SET MySQL PARAMETERS
net_read_timeout = '120',
net_write_timeout = '120'
CAST type bigint when (= precision 20) to bigserial drop typemod,
type date drop not null drop default using zero-dates-to-null,
-- type tinyint to boolean using tinyint-to-boolean,
type year to integer
MATERIALIZE VIEWS film_list, staff_list
-- INCLUDING ONLY TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/film/, 'actor'
-- EXCLUDING TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~<ory>
-- DECODING TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/messed/, ~/encoding/ AS utf8
-- ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING 'film' RENAME TO 'films'
-- ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/_list$/ SET SCHEMA 'mv'
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/_list$/, 'sales_by_store', ~/sales_by/
SET SCHEMA 'mv'
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING 'film' RENAME TO 'films'
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/./ SET (fillfactor='40')
ALTER SCHEMA 'sakila' RENAME TO 'pagila'
BEFORE LOAD DO
$$ create schema if not exists pagila; $$,
$$ create schema if not exists mv; $$,
$$ alter database sakila set search_path to pagila, mv, public; $$;
The database command accepts the following clauses and options.
MySQL Database Source Specification: FROM
Must be a connection URL pointing to a MySQL database.
If the connection URI contains a table name, then only this table is migrated from MySQL to PostgreSQL.
See the SOURCE CONNECTION STRING section above for details on how to write the connection string. The MySQL connection string accepts the same parameter sslmode as the PostgreSQL connection string, but the verify mode is not implemented (yet).
mysql://[user[:password]@][netloc][:port][/dbname][?option=value&...]
options
The same notation rules as found in the Connection String parts of the documentation apply, and we have a specific MySQL option: useSSL. The value for useSSL can be either false or true.
If both sslmode and useSSL are used in the same connection string, pgloader behavior is undefined.
The MySQL connection string also accepts the useSSL parameter with values being either false or true.
Environment variables described in <http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/environment-variables.html> can be used as default values too. If the user is not provided, then it defaults to USER environment variable value. The password can be provided with the environment variable MYSQL_PWD. The host can be provided with the environment variable MYSQL_HOST and otherwise defaults to localhost. The port can be provided with the environment variable MYSQL_TCP_PORT and otherwise defaults to 3306.
MySQL Database Migration Options: WITH
When loading from a MySQL database, the following options are supported, and the default WITH clause is: no truncate, create tables, include drop, create indexes, reset sequences, foreign keys, downcase identifiers, uniquify index names.
include drop
When this option is listed, pgloader drops all the tables in the target PostgreSQL database whose names appear in the MySQL database. This option allows for using the same command several times in a row until you figure out all the options, starting automatically from a clean environment. Please note that CASCADE is used to ensure that tables are dropped even if there are foreign keys pointing to them. This is precisely what include drop is intended to do: drop all target tables and recreate them.
Great care needs to be taken when using include drop, as it will cascade to all objects referencing the target tables, possibly including other tables that are not being loaded from the source DB.
include no drop
When this option is listed, pgloader will not include any DROP statement when loading the data.
truncate
When this option is listed, pgloader issue the TRUNCATE command against each PostgreSQL table just before loading data into it.
no truncate
When this option is listed, pgloader issues no TRUNCATE command.
disable triggers
When this option is listed, pgloader issues an ALTER TABLE … DISABLE TRIGGER ALL command against the PostgreSQL target table before copying the data, then the command ALTER TABLE … ENABLE TRIGGER ALL once the COPY is done.
This option allows loading data into a pre-existing table ignoring the foreign key constraints and user defined triggers and may result in invalid foreign key constraints once the data is loaded. Use with care.
create tables
When this option is listed, pgloader creates the table using the meta data found in the MySQL file, which must contain a list of fields with their data type. A standard data type conversion from DBF to PostgreSQL is done.
create no tables
When this option is listed, pgloader skips the creation of table before loading data, target tables must then already exist.
Also, when using create no tables pgloader fetches the metadata from the current target database and checks type casting, then will remove constraints and indexes prior to loading the data and install them back again once the loading is done.
create indexes
When this option is listed, pgloader gets the definitions of all the indexes found in the MySQL database and create the same set of index definitions against the PostgreSQL database.
create no indexes
When this option is listed, pgloader skips the creating indexes.
drop indexes
When this option is listed, pgloader drops the indexes in the target database before loading the data, and creates them again at the end of the data copy.
uniquify index names, preserve index names
MySQL index names are unique per-table whereas in PostgreSQL index names have to be unique per-schema. The default for pgloader is to change the index name by prefixing it with idx_OID where OID is the internal numeric identifier of the table the index is built against.
In somes cases like when the DDL are entirely left to a framework it might be sensible for pgloader to refrain from handling index unique names, that is achieved by using the preserve index names option.
The default is to uniquify index names.
Even when using the option preserve index names, MySQL primary key indexes named “PRIMARY” will get their names uniquified. Failing to do so would prevent the primary keys to be created again in PostgreSQL where the index names must be unique per schema.
drop schema
When this option is listed, pgloader drops the target schema in the target PostgreSQL database before creating it again and all the objects it contains. The default behavior doesn’t drop the target schemas.
foreign keys
When this option is listed, pgloader gets the definitions of all the foreign keys found in the MySQL database and create the same set of foreign key definitions against the PostgreSQL database.
no foreign keys
When this option is listed, pgloader skips creating foreign keys.
reset sequences
When this option is listed, at the end of the data loading and after the indexes have all been created, pgloader resets all the PostgreSQL sequences created to the current maximum value of the column they are attached to.
The options schema only and data only have no effects on this option.
reset no sequences
When this option is listed, pgloader skips resetting sequences after the load.
The options schema only and data only have no effects on this option.
downcase identifiers
When this option is listed, pgloader converts all MySQL identifiers (table names, index names, column names) to downcase, except for PostgreSQL reserved keywords.
The PostgreSQL reserved keywords are determined dynamically by using the system function pg_get_keywords().
quote identifiers
When this option is listed, pgloader quotes all MySQL identifiers so that their case is respected. Note that you will then have to do the same thing in your application code queries.
schema only
When this option is listed pgloader refrains from migrating the data over. Note that the schema in this context includes the indexes when the option create indexes has been listed.
data only
When this option is listed pgloader only issues the COPY statements, without doing any other processing.
single reader per thread, multiple readers per thread
The default is single reader per thread and it means that each MySQL table is read by a single thread as a whole, with a single SELECT statement using no WHERE clause.
When using multiple readers per thread pgloader may be able to divide the reading work into several threads, as many as the concurrency setting, which needs to be greater than 1 for this option to kick be activated.
For each source table, pgloader searches for a primary key over a single numeric column, or a multiple-column primary key index for which the first column is of a numeric data type (one of integer or bigint). When such an index exists, pgloader runs a query to find the min and max values on this column, and then split that range into many ranges containing a maximum of rows per range.
When the range list we then obtain contains at least as many ranges than our concurrency setting, then we distribute those ranges to each reader thread.
So when all the conditions are met, pgloader then starts as many reader thread as the concurrency setting, and each reader thread issues several queries with a WHERE id >= x AND id < y, where y - x = rows per range or less (for the last range, depending on the max value just obtained.
rows per range
How many rows are fetched per SELECT query when using multiple readers per thread, see above for details.
SET MySQL PARAMETERS
The SET MySQL PARAMETERS allows setting MySQL parameters using the MySQL SET command each time pgloader connects to it.
MySQL Database Casting Rules
The command CAST introduces user-defined casting rules.
The cast clause allows to specify custom casting rules, either to overload the default casting rules or to amend them with special cases.
A casting rule is expected to follow one of the forms:
type <mysql-type-name> [ <guard> ... ] to <pgsql-type-name> [ <option> ... ]
column <table-name>.<column-name> [ <guards> ] to ...
It’s possible for a casting rule to either match against a MySQL data type or against a given column name in a given table name. That flexibility allows to cope with cases where the type tinyint might have been used as a boolean in some cases but as a smallint in others.
The casting rules are applied in order, the first match prevents following rules to be applied, and user defined rules are evaluated first.
The supported guards are:
when unsigned
The casting rule is only applied against MySQL columns of the source type that have the keyword unsigned in their data type definition.
Example of a casting rule using a unsigned guard:
type smallint when unsigned to integer drop typemodwhen default ‘value’
The casting rule is only applied against MySQL columns of the source type that have given value, which must be a single-quoted or a double-quoted string.
when typemod expression
The casting rule is only applied against MySQL columns of the source type that have a typemod value matching the given typemod expression. The typemod is separated into its precision and scale components.
Example of a cast rule using a typemod guard:
type char when (= precision 1) to char keep typemodThis expression casts MySQL char(1) column to a PostgreSQL column of type char(1) while allowing for the general case char(N) will be converted by the default cast rule into a PostgreSQL type varchar(N).
with extra auto_increment
The casting rule is only applied against MySQL columns having the extra column auto_increment option set, so that it’s possible to target e.g. serial rather than integer.
The default matching behavior, when this option isn’t set, is to match both columns with the extra definition and without.
This means that if you want to implement a casting rule that target either serial or integer from a smallint definition depending on the auto_increment extra bit of information from MySQL, then you need to spell out two casting rules as following:
type smallint with extra auto_increment to serial drop typemod keep default keep not null, type smallint to integer drop typemod keep default keep not nullThe supported casting options are:
drop default, keep default
When the option drop default is listed, pgloader drops any existing default expression in the MySQL database for columns of the source type from the CREATE TABLE statement it generates.
The spelling keep default explicitly prevents that behaviour and can be used to overload the default casting rules.
drop not null, keep not null, set not null
When the option drop not null is listed, pgloader drops any existing NOT NULL constraint associated with the given source MySQL datatype when it creates the tables in the PostgreSQL database.
The spelling keep not null explicitly prevents that behaviour and can be used to overload the default casting rules.
When the option set not null is listed, pgloader sets a NOT NULL constraint on the target column regardless whether it has been set in the source MySQL column.
drop typemod, keep typemod
When the option drop typemod is listed, pgloader drops any existing typemod definition (e.g. precision and scale) from the datatype definition found in the MySQL columns of the source type when it created the tables in the PostgreSQL database.
The spelling keep typemod explicitly prevents that behaviour and can be used to overload the default casting rules.
using
This option takes as its single argument the name of a function to be found in the pgloader.transforms Common Lisp package. See above for details.
It’s possible to augment a default cast rule (such as one that applies against ENUM data type for example) with a transformation function by omitting entirely the type parts of the casting rule, as in the following example:
column enumerate.foo using empty-string-to-nullMySQL Views Support
MySQL views support allows pgloader to migrate view as if they were base tables. This feature then allows for on-the-fly transformation from MySQL to PostgreSQL, as the view definition is used rather than the base data.
MATERIALIZE VIEWS
This clause allows you to implement custom data processing at the data source by providing a view definition against which pgloader will query the data. It’s not possible to just allow for plain SQL because we want to know a lot about the exact data types of each column involved in the query output.
This clause expect a comma separated list of view definitions, each one being either the name of an existing view in your database or the following expression:
*name* `AS` `$$` *sql query* `$$`
The name and the sql query will be used in a CREATE VIEW statement at the beginning of the data loading, and the resulting view will then be dropped at the end of the data loading.
MATERIALIZE ALL VIEWS
Same behaviour as MATERIALIZE VIEWS using the dynamic list of views as returned by MySQL rather than asking the user to specify the list.
MySQL Partial Migration
INCLUDING ONLY TABLE NAMES MATCHING
Introduce a comma separated list of table names or regular expression used to limit the tables to migrate to a sublist.
Example:
including only table names matching ~/film/, 'actor'
EXCLUDING TABLE NAMES MATCHING
Introduce a comma separated list of table names or regular expression used to exclude table names from the migration. This filter only applies to the result of the INCLUDING filter.
excluding table names matching ~<ory>
MySQL Encoding Support
DECODING TABLE NAMES MATCHING
Introduce a comma separated list of table names or regular expressions used to force the encoding to use when processing data from MySQL. If the data encoding known to you is different from MySQL’s idea about it, this is the option to use.
decoding table names matching ~/messed/, ~/encoding/ AS utf8
You can use as many such rules as you need, all with possibly different encodings.
MySQL Schema Transformations
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING
Introduce a comma separated list of table names or regular expressions that you want to target in the pgloader ALTER TABLE command. Available actions are SET SCHEMA, RENAME TO, and SET:
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/_list$/, 'sales_by_store', ~/sales_by/
SET SCHEMA 'mv'
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING 'film' RENAME TO 'films'
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/./ SET (fillfactor='40')
ALTER TABLE NAMES MATCHING ~/./ SET TABLESPACE 'pg_default'
You can use as many such rules as you need. The list of tables to be migrated is searched in pgloader memory against the ALTER TABLE matching rules, and for each command pgloader stops at the first matching criteria (regexp or string).
No ALTER TABLE command is sent to PostgreSQL, the modification happens at the level of the pgloader in-memory representation of your source database schema. In case of a name change, the mapping is kept and reused in the foreign key and index support.
The SET () action takes effect as a WITH clause for the CREATE TABLE command that pgloader will run when it has to create a table.
The SET TABLESPACE action takes effect as a TABLESPACE clause for the CREATE TABLE command that pgloader will run when it has to create a table.
MySQL Migration: limitations
The database command currently only supports MySQL source database and has the following limitations:
Views are not migrated,
Supporting views might require implementing a full SQL parser for the MySQL dialect with a porting engine to rewrite the SQL against PostgreSQL, including renaming functions and changing some constructs.
While it’s not theoretically impossible, don’t hold your breath.
Triggers are not migrated
The difficulty of doing so is not yet assessed.
Of the geometric datatypes, only the POINT database has been covered. The other ones should be easy enough to implement now, it’s just not done yet.
Default MySQL Casting Rules
When migrating from MySQL the following Casting Rules are provided:
Numbers:
type int with extra auto_increment to serial when (< precision 10)
type int with extra auto_increment to bigserial when (<= 10 precision)
type int to int when (< precision 10)
type int to bigint when (>= 10 precision)
type tinyint with extra auto_increment to serial
type smallint with extra auto_increment to serial
type mediumint with extra auto_increment to serial
type bigint with extra auto_increment to bigserial
type tinyint to boolean when (= 1 precision) using tinyint-to-boolean
type bit when (= 1 precision) to boolean drop typemod using bits-to-boolean
type bit to bit drop typemod using bits-to-hex-bitstring
type bigint when signed to bigint drop typemod
type bigint when (< 19 precision) to numeric drop typemod
type tinyint when unsigned to smallint drop typemod
type smallint when unsigned to integer drop typemod
type mediumint when unsigned to integer drop typemod
type integer when unsigned to bigint drop typemod
type tinyint to smallint drop typemod
type smallint to smallint drop typemod
type mediumint to integer drop typemod
type integer to integer drop typemod
type bigint to bigint drop typemod
type float to float drop typemod
type double to double precision drop typemod
type numeric to numeric keep typemod
type decimal to decimal keep typemod
Texts:
type char to char keep typemod using remove-null-characters
type varchar to varchar keep typemod using remove-null-characters
type tinytext to text using remove-null-characters
type text to text using remove-null-characters
type mediumtext to text using remove-null-characters
type longtext to text using remove-null-characters
Binary:
type binary to bytea using byte-vecotr-to-bytea
type varbinary to bytea using byte-vecotr-to-bytea
type tinyblob to bytea using byte-vecotr-to-bytea
type blob to bytea using byte-vecotr-to-bytea
type mediumblob to bytea using byte-vecotr-to-bytea
type longblob to bytea using byte-vecotr-to-bytea
Date:
type datetime when default "0000-00-00 00:00:00" and not null
to timestamptz drop not null drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type datetime when default "0000-00-00 00:00:00"
to timestamptz drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type datetime with extra on update current timestamp when not null
to timestamptz drop not null drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type datetime with extra on update current timestamp
to timestamptz drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type timestamp when default "0000-00-00 00:00:00" and not null
to timestamptz drop not null drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type timestamp when default "0000-00-00 00:00:00"
to timestamptz drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type date when default "0000-00-00" to date drop default
using zero-dates-to-null
type date to date
type datetime to timestamptz
type timestamp to timestamptz
type year to integer drop typemod
Geometric:
type geometry to point using convert-mysql-point
type point to point using convert-mysql-point
type linestring to path using convert-mysql-linestring
Enum types are declared inline in MySQL and separately with a CREATE TYPE command in PostgreSQL, so each column of Enum Type is converted to a type named after the table and column names defined with the same labels in the same order.
When the source type definition is not matched in the default casting rules nor in the casting rules provided in the command, then the type name with the typemod is used.