Lesson Learned #25: Export/Import Azure SQL Database using Azure File Service?

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In some situations, we need to import or export our Azure SQL Database using SQLPackage, but, unfortunately, either source and destination file we cannot specify a blob storage, in case that we want to save the file in this storage. For this reason, we have to use a local temporal folder for uploading/downloading the file depending on our needs.

However, we have an alternative, using Azure File Services. Once we have configured this we could use it as a local drive and use this for our SQLPackage.

For example, I create an Azure File Storage and I connect it using the following command:

  • net use f: \\myfile.file.core.windows.net\mysqlpackage /u:useraccount mykey
  • Once we have specified this network drive we could use sqlpackge, like this one to import our data. sqlpackage.exe /a:import /sf:f:\data.bacpac /tdn:mydb /tsn:myserver.database.windows.net /tp:password /tu:user

Enjoy!