Recently I was doing a demo and a customer asked how I had linked my commit in Azure DevOps to the work item that existed. It’s easy, and tldr; it’s with the commit comment. This post shows how that works.
I’ve been working with Flyway Desktop for work more and more as we transition from older SSMS plugins to the standalone tool. This series looks at some tips I’ve gotten along the way.
Creating an Issue
Many people use GitHub and adding issues is easy. You go to the Issues tab, click “New” and enter details. What is required might vary by project. I have a public demo project here: https://github.com/way0utwest/FlywayNorthwind
My issues tab has a few items, but you can see one of the issues below. Note, I’m not proud of this, as I just added this for a demo. I didn’t really add enough detail for anyone to work off this. I’ll do better with other issues.
In any case, the thing to note is I have a #1 at the top, meaning this is issue #1. If I type a comment or note anywhere in this project and include #1, a link is created to this issue.
Linking A Commit in FWD
This is very similar to the technique I showed in Azure DevOps. Actually, it’s the same. I’ll make some changes for a products table and generate a migration script. When I go to the Version Control blade, I see the changes and I commit them with a message that includes #1.
In the GitHub code tab, I see my commit message, and the #1 is hyperlinked. If I hover over it, I see the issue.
In the Issue itself, I see a flow with the commit listed.
Now I’m not only tracking discussion and comments of the issue, I’m linking commits as well.
This is less a Flyway Desktop feature than a GitHub one, but you can access this from Flyway Desktop by writing good commit messages with Issue numbers.
Try Flyway Desktop out today. If you haven’t worked with Flyway Desktop, download it today. There is a free version that organizes migrations and paid versions with many more features.
Video Walkthrough
I made a quick video showing this as well. You can watch it below, or check out all the Flyway videos I’ve added: