Company
Date Published
Author
Paul Scanlon
Word count
1333
Language
English
Hacker News points
None

Summary

A Neon Twin is a copy of a production database, isolated from the main environment, allowing developers to work on new features or track bugs without affecting the live database. This process involves creating a scheduled GitHub Action that performs a partial data dump of the production database and restores it to a Neon Serverless Postgres instance. The action uses environment variables to securely store connection strings for the production and Neon databases, and includes steps to install PostgreSQL, set the binary path, dump schema, dump data, drop tables and schema, restore schema, and restore data. By using a Neon Twin, developers can create isolated environments that mirror staging or production, making it easier to develop and test new features without affecting the live database. Additionally, plans are in place to anonymize sensitive data whenever a branch is created, further securing the workflow.