February 22, 2026
Database tests are the tests most teams get wrong. They either skip them entirely (testing with mocks, then discovering schema mismatches in production), or they build a fragile suite sharing a single database where tests interfere with each other. The right approach depends on what you are testing and what tradeoffs you can accept.
Fixtures are static SQL files loaded before a test suite runs:
February 22, 2026
Database migrations are the highest-risk routine operations most teams perform. A bad migration can cause downtime, data loss, or application errors that cascade across every service that touches the affected tables. This operational sequence walks through the assessment, planning, execution, and rollback of database migrations from simple column additions to full platform changes.
Every migration falls into one of three categories, each with a different risk profile:
February 22, 2026
A backup you have never tested restoring is not a backup. This covers the main backup tools, when to use each, point-in-time recovery, and automation.
pg_dump exports a single database as SQL or a compressed binary format. It takes a consistent snapshot without blocking writes.
# Custom format (compressed, supports parallel restore)
pg_dump -U postgres -Fc -d myapp -f myapp.dump
# Directory format (parallel dump)
pg_dump -U postgres -Fd -j 4 -d myapp -f myapp_dir/pg_dumpall exports every database plus cluster-wide objects. In practice, dump roles separately and per-database for flexibility:
February 21, 2026
Kubernetes clusters contain two fundamentally different types of state: cluster state (the Kubernetes objects themselves – Deployments, Services, ConfigMaps, Secrets, CRDs) and application data (the contents of Persistent Volumes). A complete backup strategy must address both. Most backup failures happen because teams back up one but not the other, or because they never test the restore process.
Before choosing tools, inventory what your cluster contains: