Configure comparison options

Last modified: March 28, 2025

You can use project options to configure the behavior of Schema Compare.

Befor running a schema comparison, you can configure the comparison options on the Options page of the New Schema Comparison wizard. After reviewing the comparison results, you can adjust the options on the Options page of the Change Schema Comparison Properties wizard. The options you set are saved for each project in a *.scomp file.

Default options

If you wish to set the current selection of options as your defaults, click Save As My Defaults. These options will be applied to all new projects.

To restore your defaults after making changes, click My Defaults.

To reset all options to their original settings, click Devart Defaults.

Options are conveniently grouped, with detailed descriptions provided for each option.

Search for options

On the Options page, you can search for comparison options by typing the search text or symbol, such as a wildcard or an underscore, in the Search box. The list is filtered to display only those options that contain the search text.

The default search mode is case-insensitive. It means that searching for a term like ignore will highlight all options containing the text, regardless of whether they are capitalized (Ignore) or lowercase (ignore). As you type, the text matching your search criteria will be highlighted in the grid. The number of matching options will be displayed in the search bar.

If you enter text separated by spaces, each subsequent input will highlight new results accordingly.

To remove the search input, click in the Search box.

Save settings to a command-line arguments file

On the Options page, you can save command-line arguments and settings to a .txt file. To do this, click Save settings to a command-line arguments file.

The Save As dialog opens, allowing you to select the destination path to save the file. The default name is SchemaCompareArgs.txt. You can specify a different name and click Save. The file includes information such as the source and target connections, along with a list of comparison options indicating whether each option is turned on (Enabled) or turned off (No):

Note

The command-line arguments file includes not only comparison options but also synchronization options.

Schema comparison options

Option name	Option Group	Default State	Option Description
Disable dependency analysis	Common	Disabled	Disables dependency building algorithms and describes object types selected in the Object filter.
Disable AUTO_INCREMENT clause	Common	Disabled	Ignores AUTO_INCREMENT clause in table definition.
Disable AUTO_INCREMENT table option	Common	Enabled	Ignores auto increment table option.
Ignore average row length	Common	Enabled	Ignores average row length table option.
Ignore collations	Common	Disabled	Ignores column collations during the database comparison and synchronization.
Ignore column data types	Common	Disabled	Ignores data types during comparison and synchronization. The column data types in the target tables will be preserved if possible.
Ignore column default values	Common	Disabled	Ignores column default values during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore DEFINER clause	Common	Enabled	Ignores DEFINER clauses for Procedures, Functions, Triggers, Views, and Events during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore ENDS clause	Common	Disabled	Ignores ENDS clause in event definition.
Ignore permissions	Common	Disabled	Ignores security permissions during comparison and synchronization. Target database permissions will be preserved if possible.
Ignore SQL SECURITY clause	Common	Enabled	Ignores SQL SECURITY clause for procedures and views.
Ignore STARTS clause	Common	Disabled	Ignores STARTS or AT clauses in event definition.
Ignore table engine	Common	Disabled	Ignores table engine.
Associate column names having similar name options, 80%	Auto Mapping	Disabled	Considers similar column names (for example, ‘column1’ and ‘column1a’) equal.
Ignore case in object names	Auto Mapping	Disabled	Ignores case in object names during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore spaces in object names	Auto Mapping	Disabled	Ignores spaces in object names during comparison and synchronization.
Force column order	Tables	Enabled	Forces the re-creation of the table when adding new columns to it.
Ignore NOT NULL constraint	Tables	Disabled	Ignores the NOT NULL constraint for a column during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore partitions	Tables	Disabled	Ignores partitions during comparison.
Ignore row format table option	Table	Enabled	Ignores ROW-FORMAT table option during comparison.
Ignore application-time periods	Temporal Tables	Disabled	Ignores application-time periods during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore application-time period name	Temporal Tables	Enabled	Ignores the names of application-time periods during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore application-time period columns	Temporal Tables	Enabled	Ignores the DATE_START and DATE_END columns during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore SYSTEM VERSIONING	Temporal Tables	Disabled	Ignores the SYSTEM VERSIONING properties during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore system-time period columns	Temporal Tables	Enabled	Ignores the ROW_START and ROW_END columns during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore case	Script Objects	Disabled	Ignores case differences in the object’s body during comparison.
Ignore COMMENT objects	Script Objects	Disabled	Ignores COMMENT objects during comparison.
Ignore comments	Script Objects	Disabled	Ignores comments while comparing stored procedures, views, functions, etc.
Ignore synonyms for functions on source objects	Script Objects	Enabled	Ignores the difference between the function names and the names of their synonyms.
Ignore white spaces	Script Objects	Disabled	Ignores white spaces (new lines, tabs, spaces, etc.) during comparison and synchronization. Original white spaces in the scripts for database objects and computed columns are preserved.
Ignore table DML triggers	Triggers	Disabled	Ignores DML triggers during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore firing order for DML triggers	Triggers	Disabled	Ignores trigger fire order.
Ignore check constraints	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores check constraints during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore column order in indexes	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores the included columns order during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore constraint names	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores the constraint names during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore foreign keys actions ON UPDATE and ON DELETE	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores the cascading referential integrity constraints for foreign keys during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore fulltext indexes	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores fulltext indexes during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore index names	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores index names during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore indexes	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores indexes in tables and views during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore primary keys	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores the differences in primary keys during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore spatial indexes	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores spatial indexes during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore foreign keys	Indexes and constraints	Disabled	Ignores foreign keys during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore CACHE	Sequences	Disabled	Ignores CACHE in sequences during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore CYCLE	Sequences	Disabled	Ignores CYCLE in sequences during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore INCREMENT BY	Sequences	Disabled	Ignores INCREMENT BY in sequences during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore MAXVALUE	Sequences	Disabled	Ignores MAXVALUE in sequences during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore MINVALUE	Sequences	Disabled	Ignores MINVALUE in sequences during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore START	Sequences	Enabled	Ignores START WITH in sequences during comparison and synchronization.
Ignore triggers present only in Target	Keep objects in target	Disabled	Ignores dropped DML triggers in target while comparing and synchronizing tables or views.
Ignore indexes present only in target	Keep objects in target	Disabled	Ignores dropped indexes in target while comparing and synchronizing tables or views.