Rake migrate says table already exists

Rails
1

Hi all,

I used the generate script to make a bunch of table migrations,
resulting in files like 002_bookmarks.rb, 003_tags.rb, etc. When I
did the ‘rake migrate’, the db was set up but more migration files
appeared, now called 009_create_bookmarks.rb, 010_create_tags.rb,
etc. Now when I want to change the database (add a table or column,
alter the schema) I do ./script/generate migration do_something_new
and rake migrate gives me:

(in /home/jason/Svn/working/trunk)
** Invoke migrate (first_time)
** Invoke db:migrate (first_time)
** Invoke environment (first_time)
** Execute environment**
Execute db:migrate== CreateBookmarks: migrating
=================================================
– create_table(:bookmarks)
– create_table(:bookmarks)
rake aborted!Mysql::Error: Table ‘bookmarks’ already exists: CREATE
TABLE bookmarks (id int(11) DEFAULT NULL auto_increment PRIMARY
KEY) ENGINE=InnoDB

It looks like it’s trying to build everything from the ground up, but
of course it can’t because that’s already done. I thought rake was
only supposed to run the new migrations you make after the last rake
migrate. Do I have to create destructive migrations to start over?

If anyone’s run into this before, a helpful nudge would be great.

Thanks!
-Jason

PS: Mysql’s permissions/grants are turned off so it’s not an
authorization problem.

2

Jason F. wrote:

Hi all,

I used the generate script to make a bunch of table migrations,
resulting in files like 002_bookmarks.rb, 003_tags.rb, etc. When I
did the ‘rake migrate’, the db was set up but more migration files
appeared, now called 009_create_bookmarks.rb, 010_create_tags.rb,
etc. Now when I want to change the database (add a table or column,
alter the schema) I do ./script/generate migration do_something_new
and rake migrate gives me:

(in /home/jason/Svn/working/trunk)
** Invoke migrate (first_time)
** Invoke db:migrate (first_time)
** Invoke environment (first_time)
** Execute environment**
Execute db:migrate== CreateBookmarks: migrating
=================================================
– create_table(:bookmarks)
– create_table(:bookmarks)
rake aborted!Mysql::Error: Table ‘bookmarks’ already exists: CREATE
TABLE bookmarks (id int(11) DEFAULT NULL auto_increment PRIMARY
KEY) ENGINE=InnoDB

It looks like it’s trying to build everything from the ground up, but
of course it can’t because that’s already done. I thought rake was
only supposed to run the new migrations you make after the last rake
migrate. Do I have to create destructive migrations to start over?

If anyone’s run into this before, a helpful nudge would be great.

Thanks!
-Jason

PS: Mysql’s permissions/grants are turned off so it’s not an
authorization problem.

I ran into what I think your experiencing. I created my base migration
file, ran it but then later, throughout the development of the app I was
working on, I had to generate new Models. After I would create these new
models, I would go and add them to my base migration doc as well. Doing
that, I ran into the exact same problem you’re seeing. I would rake
migrate but it would error out telling me one of my tables already exist
(which it did at that point). Basically, script/generating Models
creates their migration doc as well so you don’t have to. What I’ll do
in the future is either not script/generate migration files anymore and
just use what gets created when I generate models.

3

Jason,

Try this. Figure out what version your database is at. Take a look at
the
schema table to find out the version. Then, what I would suggest, is to
step
back version by version using the command “rake migrate VERSION=16” (for
example). Step back and forth until you find the guilty party. What
could be
happening is that you have an empty migration that is made by a model
and
then you made another one later that trys to make the table again. So,
you
should either edit the original migration to add the needed columns, or
fix
the new migration to alter the table instead.

In the future, you can generate a model without a migration by doing
“script/generate model mymode --skip-migration”

HTH,
Ryan