Working with a Cloud database locally

Explanation on how to work with an Umbraco Cloud database locally, connecting to your local database using Visual Studio and working with custom tables in the Cloud database

This article will cover how you can connect to the database of your project that you have locally on your machine and it will also cover how you can work with custom table with Umbraco Cloud.

Connecting to your local Umbraco installation

When cloning down your project to work locally you might want to have a look in your database every now and then.

Since Umbraco 10, SQL CE is no longer supported, instead, Umbraco now comes with SQLite out of the box. When you clone down your Umbraco project and restore its content, it will create a Umbraco.sqlite.db file in ~/umbraco/Data/Umbraco.sqlite.db.

To view your local SQLite database, you will need to use a program like DB Browser for SQLite or a Visual Studio extension like SQLite and SQL Server Compact Toolbox.

You can also configure your project to prefer SQL Server LocalDb when it's available on your local machine by enabling the Deploy PreferLocalDbConnectionString setting.

To configure your database, you can add the connection string in the 'appsettings.json' file. For more information, see the Configure your database section in the Unattended Installs article.

Using Custom Tables with Umbraco Cloud

Umbraco Cloud will ensure that your Umbraco related data is always up to date, but it won't know anything about data in custom tables unless told. Nothing new here, it's like any other host when it comes to non-Umbraco data.

The good news is that you have full access to the SQL Azure databases running on Umbraco Cloud and you can create custom tables like you'd expect on any other hosting provider. The easiest way to do this is to connect using SQL Management Studio.

A recommended way of making sure your custom tables are present, is to use Migrations to ensure that the tables will be created or altered when starting your site. Migrations will ensure that if you are adding environments to your Umbraco Cloud site, then the tables in the newly created databases will automatically be created for you. Check Creating a custom Database table for an example of how to create and use Migrations.