Journal management

This article describes Journal management.

Journal contains information about metadata operations done on your database.

The metadata operations can result from a management command that a user executed, or internal management commands that the system executed, such as drop extents by retention.

Taking a dependency on them isn’t recommended.

EventEventTimestampDatabaseEntityNameUpdatedEntityNameEntityVersionEntityContainerName
CREATE-TABLE2017-01-05 14:25:07InternalDbMyTable1MyTable1v7.0InternalDb
RENAME-TABLE2017-01-13 10:30:01InternalDbMyTable1MyTable2v8.0InternalDb
OriginalEntityStateUpdatedEntityStateChangeCommandPrincipal
.Name: MyTable1, Attributes: Name=’[MyTable1].[col1]’, Type=‘I32’.create table MyTable1 (col1:int)imike@fabrikam.com
.The database properties (too long to be displayed here).create database TestDB persist (@“https://imfbkm.blob.core.windows.net/md", @“https://imfbkm.blob.core.windows.net/data")Microsoft Entra app id=76263cdb-abcd-545644e9c404
Name: MyTable1, Attributes: Name=’[MyTable1].[col1]’, Type=‘I32’Name: MyTable2, Attributes: Name=’[MyTable1].[col1]’, Type=‘I32’.rename table MyTable1 to MyTable2rdmik@fabrikam.com
ItemDescription
EventThe metadata event name
EventTimestampThe event timestamp
DatabaseMetadata of this database was changed following the event
EntityNameThe entity name that the operation was executed on, before the change
UpdatedEntityNameThe new entity name after the change
EntityVersionThe new metadata version following the change
EntityContainerNameThe entity container name (entity=column, container=table)
OriginalEntityStateThe state of the entity (entity properties) before the change
UpdatedEntityStateThe new state after the change
ChangeCommandThe executed management command that triggered the metadata change
PrincipalThe principal (user/app) that executed the management command

.show journal

The .show journal command returns a list of metadata changes on databases or the cluster that the user has admin access to. The .show journal command returns a list of metadata changes on databases or the environment that the user has admin access to. Permissions

Everyone with permission can execute the command.

Results returned will include:

  • All journal entries of the user executing the command.

  • All journal entries of databases that the user executing the command has admin access to.

  • All cluster journal entries if the user executing the command is a Cluster AllDatabases Admin.

  • All journal entries specific to the environment level if the user executing the command has appropriate admin permissions.

.show database DatabaseName journal

The .show database DatabaseName journal command returns journal for the specific database metadata changes.

Permissions

Everyone with permission can execute the command.

Results returned include:

  • All journal entries of database DatabaseName if the user executing the command is a database admin in DatabaseName.
  • Otherwise, all the journal entries of database DatabaseName and of the user executing the command.