The following build configuration shows how to drop/create a database and schema, then populate it before the test phase, and drop the database after the test phase.
<project> [...] <build> [...] <plugins> <plugin> <groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId> <artifactId>sql-maven-plugin</artifactId> <version>1.0.9-SNAPSHOT</version> <dependencies> <!-- specify the dependent jdbc driver here --> <dependency> <groupId>postgresql</groupId> <artifactId>postgresql</artifactId> <version>8.1-407.jdbc3</version> </dependency> </dependencies> <!-- common configuration shared by all executions --> <configuration> <driver>org.postgresql.Driver</driver> <url>jdbc:postgressql://localhost:5432:yourdb</url> <username>postgres</username> <password>password</password> <!-- You can comment out username/password configurations and have maven to look them up in your settings.xml using ${settingsKey} --> <settingsKey>sensibleKey</settingsKey> <!--all executions are ignored if -Dmaven.test.skip=true--> <skip>${maven.test.skip}</skip> </configuration> <executions> <execution> <id>drop-db-before-test-if-any</id> <phase>process-test-resources</phase> <goals> <goal>execute</goal> </goals> <configuration> <!-- need another database to drop the targeted one --> <url>jdbc:postgressql://localhost:5432:bootstrapdb</url> <autocommit>true</autocommit> <sqlCommand>drop database yourdb</sqlCommand> <!-- ignore error when database is not avaiable --> <onError>continue</onError> </configuration> </execution> <execution> <id>create-db</id> <phase>process-test-resources</phase> <goals> <goal>execute</goal> </goals> <configuration> <url>jdbc:postgressql://localhost:5432:yourdb</url> <!-- no transaction --> <autocommit>true</autocommit> <sqlCommand>create database yourdb</sqlCommand> </configuration> </execution> <execution> <id>create-schema</id> <phase>process-test-resources</phase> <goals> <goal>execute</goal> </goals> <configuration> <autocommit>true</autocommit> <srcFiles> <srcFile>src/main/sql/your-schema.sql</srcFile> </srcFiles> </configuration> </execution> <execution> <id>create-data</id> <phase>process-test-resources</phase> <goals> <goal>execute</goal> </goals> <configuration> <orderFile>ascending</orderFile> <fileset> <basedir>${basedir}</basedir> <includes> <include>src/test/sql/test-data2.sql</include> <include>src/test/sql/test-data1.sql</include> </includes> </fileset> </configuration> </execution> <!-- drop db after test --> <execution> <id>drop-db-after-test</id> <phase>test/phase> <goals> <goal>execute</goal> </goals> <configuration> <autocommit>true</autocommit> <sqlCommand>drop database yourdb</sqlCommand> </configuration> </execution> </executions> </plugin> [...] </plugins> [...] </build> [...] </project>