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Deploying to Crawlspace is as simple as running crsp deploy. There are a few things that happen behind the scenes that you should be aware of.

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Immutability

Crawlers deployed to Crawlspace are atomic and immutable. This means that any changes to the Crawlspace platform or underlying code will not affect the code of your deployed crawler. To pick up new platform changes, simply redeploy your crawler with crsp deploy. Read the changelog to learn about new features that have been recently released.

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Migrations

If your crawler’s schema changes between deploys, Crawlspace performs the associated migrations to your database automatically. Read below for more details, and potential repercussions, of deploying schema changes. Some operations are destructive, meaning that they will result in data loss for the data stored in that column. It’s recommended that you download a copy of your crawler’s dataset before deploying any schema changes.

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Adding a column

If you add a new key to your schema, then a new column gets created in your crawler’s table. Previously-inserted rows will have a null value for the new column. Adding a new column is not destructive.

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Removing a column

If you delete a key from your schema, then that column and all of its data will be dropped from your crawler’s table. Removing a column is destructive.

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Renaming a column

Renaming a key in your schema effectively drops the column, and then adds a new column with a new name back. Renaming a column is destructive.

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Changing a column’s type

Changing a column’s type effectively drops the column, and then adds the column back with the new type. As such, changing a column’s type is destructive.

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Changing a column’s constraints

If you add a unique contraint to a column with .describe('unique'), then the column will first be dropped before it is re-added with the unique constraint. The column must first be dropped because it is possible that there already exist duplicate values within the column. An index will be created for the column after it is re-added. Changing a column’s constraints is destructive.
Once you define a column as unique, you cannot remove the unique constraint. You will need to deploy a version with the column removed to fully remove the unique constraint.