Iceberg table rollbacks

Table snapshots can be used to roll a Datalake Iceberg table back or forward to a specific point in time when a given snapshot was taken.

This capability allows changes to a table to be reversed to a previous state. Tables can be rolled back or forward using one of the roll back or set to stored procedures. For more information see Iceberg rollback procedures, ROLLBACK TO SNAPSHOT, ROLLBACK TO TIMESTAMP, SET TO SNAPSHOT, SET TO TIMESTAMP.

When you change a table’s snapshot, the snapshot rolled back to or set to becomes the current snapshot and the data belonging to the table at that point in time becomes the current data.

Building on the example in the Iceberg table snapshots section, if we were to roll back the EMPLOYEE table to the point in time when snapshot 1429911045991981825 was taken, our table would contain two rows as illustrated below.

select * from employee

 ID       NAME                   AGE        

------------------------------------------
 1        Sam Smith               25
 
 2        Sarah Richards          35

Only the table data is rolled back; the table schema is not changed.