Ask HN: Database with Pull Requests?

3 points by diafygi ↗ HN
Howdy HN,

I'm working on a volunteer project that will be creating a public database of election and ballot information. I'd like for people to be able to submit proposed updates to the data for review, similar to how you can submit a pull request for code changes on github.

Is there a platform/tool/database that lets people collaboratively manage a dataset like this?

The nearest examples I can think of are:

1. Github/Gitlab/etc. - Code-management platforms that keep track of version history and have the ability to have branches, issues, and merge requests.

2. Open Street Maps/Open Railway Maps/etc. - Wiki platforms that have version history and have tools for collaborative management of the map dataset.

However, I can't seem to find such a platform for collaborative database management. I guess I could try to hack in that kind of management by basically making the dataset a series of flat files on github and let people use that to file pull requests, but then things like foreign keys wouldn't automatically update.

3 comments

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Not exactly like pull requests, but I'm working on a versioned open source database system:

https://sirix.io

Basically each commit results in a new (efficient) snapshot which shares database pages, which have not been touched by modifications. Furthermore record pages are not simply copied when only a single record has been inserted/updated/deleted.

Basically you could always revert to a former revision and commit a new version.

Kind regards Johannes

Can you host a sqlite file on GitHub instead of using flat files?