Initial version of collation migration scripts.

README.md

@@ -0,0 +1,50 @@
+# SQL Server Collation Migration (UTF-8 / UTF-16) – Data Copy + Verification
+
+This repository contains **two main scripts** to support a SQL Server 2022 migration scenario:
+
+1. **Data copy (Variant B / Checkpointing)**: copies data from a source database into a target database **table-by-table** with restart capability.
+2. **Verification / compare script**: compares source & target databases **without comparing row contents** (rowcounts + schema + programmable objects + principals).
+
+> Intended usage: build a new target DB (e.g. UTF-8 collation), deploy schema, run copy, then verify.
+
+## Repository layout
+
+- `scripts/migrate_copy_checkpoint.sql`  
+  Copy data source → target (restartable, per-table commit, FK-aware order, live progress output)
+
+- `scripts/compare_source_target.sql`  
+  Compare source vs target (**textual summaries + result sets**)  
+  - Rowcounts per table
+  - Column schema diffs
+  - Views/Procs/Functions hash compare
+  - Trigger hash compare
+  - Users/Roles + Role memberships
+
+- `docs/USAGE.md`  
+  How to run the migration copy safely.
+
+- `docs/VERIFY.md`  
+  How to run and interpret the compare results.
+
+## Quickstart
+
+1. Open **SQL Server Management Studio** (SSMS)
+2. Ensure target DB exists and schema is deployed
+3. Run:
+   - `scripts/migrate_copy_checkpoint.sql`
+4. After successful copy, run:
+   - `scripts/compare_source_target.sql`
+
+Both scripts show **live progress output** in SSMS (Messages tab).
+
+## Configuration
+
+At the top of each script set:
+
+- `@SourceDb` (default `sysdb_UTF8`)
+- `@TargetDb` (default `sysdb_utf8_jr`)
+
+## Notes
+
+- The copy script disables triggers, constraints, and nonclustered indexes in target during load and re-enables them afterwards.
+- The compare script uses hashes (SHA2_256) for object definitions to quickly detect differences.