Agent skill · data analytics · jeremylongshore
databricks-uc-migration-pilot
Pilot a Databricks Hive Metastore (HMS) → Unity Catalog (UC) migration before the deadline — audit every table's migratability, produce a dependency-ordered migration plan, trace UC's two-level permission model, and pick an environment isolation pattern. Use when a user asks how to migrate off the Hive metastore, move to Unity Catalog, which tables are UC-ready, why a table won't migrate, why a user lacks access after migration, or how to isolate dev/test/prod under UC. Trigger with "migrate to unity catalog", "hive metastore migration", "uc migration", "which tables can migrate", "unity catalog permission".
Why this skill is useful
Adds executable scripts for auditing Hive Metastore readiness, generating migration plans, and tracing permissions that are not available in public documentation.
What it needs
Requires aws, databricks, jq, python3 installed locally. Requires databricks account access. About 9k tokens when loaded. Last updated 2026-08-07. 2,604 stars on the source repository.
What this skill does
Databricks Unity Catalog Migration Pilot Pilots a Hive Metastore → Unity Catalog migration end to end: it audits which tables can migrate (and why the rest cannot), turns that audit into a dependency-ordered execution plan, traces UC's two-level permission model when access breaks, and picks an environment-isolation pattern for the one-metastore-per-region constraint. Overview The September 30, 2026 forcing function. Databricks is deprecating the legacy Hive Metastore. On the cutover date the hivemetastore catalog goes read-only — no new writes, no schema changes — and stays available only for read-through while you migrate. Everything that writes to HMS (jobs, DLT pipelines, dashboards, external BI) must be pointed at a Unity Catalog table before then, or it breaks. This is not optional and it is not fast: the blockers below (legacy storage schemes, DBFS-root managed data, DENY-based ACLs) each require a physical data move or a grant rewrite, so the work is measured in weeks, not an afternoon. ⚠️ Verify the exact date and scope against your workspace's current deprecation notice (Databricks account console → Previews / Announcements). Deprecation dates move; this skill's job is to get you ready well ahead of whatever the live date is — treat 2026-09-30 as the planning deadline, not an excuse to wait for it. This skill does four things, in order, and each is deterministic where it can be: 1. Detect — scripts/audit-hms-readiness.py classifies every HMS table by its storage URI into READY (cloud-native, UC-governable), BLOCKED (a named un-migratable condition), or ORPHAN (a dangling HMS row pointing at deleted storage). The LLM never eyeballs a URI; the script owns the verdict. 2. Plan — the migration-planner subagent turns the readiness CSV into a per-table plan (SYNC / DEEP CLONE / rewrite / skip) ordered by dependencies so a view never migrates before its base tables. 3. …
How to use it
Reference it in AdaL, Claude Code, Cursor or any coding agent — nothing to install:
@skills jeremylongshore/databricks-uc-migration-pilot