# ridgepole/ridgepole

Ridgepole is a tool to manage DB schema.  It defines DB schema using Rails DSL, and updates DB schema according to DSL. (like Chef/Puppet)

Repository: https://github.com/ridgepole/ridgepole
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/ridgepole
Language: Ruby
License: MIT
License Family: permissive
Topics: rails, ruby, mysql, postgresql, activerecord, database-migrations, declarative-migrations, schema-migration, schema-migrations, db-migration, declaretive, schema-management
Last push: 2026-08-31T07:01:48+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 77/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-02T17:46:02.011165+00:00)
- activity 100, release rhythm 35, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4448, "days_push": 2, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_releases
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1117, forks 137 (observed 2026-09-01T02:14:06.323421+00:00)

## What it is
Ridgepole is a Ruby CLI tool that manages database schemas declaratively using Rails schema DSL. It diffs the desired schema definition against the live database and applies the changes automatically, similar to Chef/Puppet for infrastructure.

## Use cases
- manage database schema as code instead of hand-written migrations
- apply declarative schema changes to MySQL or PostgreSQL
- diff and sync a Schemafile with an existing Rails database
- replace sequential ActiveRecord migrations with a single schema definition
- version-control database schema changes in a team workflow

## When to choose
- you use Rails/ActiveRecord and prefer declarative schema management over migration files
- you want idempotent schema convergence like Chef/Puppet for your database
- you manage MySQL or PostgreSQL schemas across environments and want reproducible diffs

## When to avoid
- you are not in the Ruby/Rails ecosystem
- you rely on data migrations or complex step-by-step migration logic
- you need databases other than MySQL/PostgreSQL with ActiveRecord adapters

## Facets
- artifact type: cli-tool
- maturity: active
- function: database, configuration-management, cli, developer-tools
- domain: databases, developer-tools, web-development
- platform: ruby, cli
- tags: schema-migration, declarative-schema, activerecord, mysql, postgresql, rails-dsl, infrastructure-as-code-for-db, automation, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- ridgepole/ridgepole (main) score 77

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-09-01T02:14:06.323421+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T06:41:54.958610+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/ridgepole/ridgepole (fetched 2026-09-01T02:14:06.323421+00:00, sha e1d3e4f5046b)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.