ad-migration setup-target prepares the target dbt project and validates the source-facing dbt layer.

Run it after DDL extraction, scoping, and source or exclude decisions. The command consumes catalog decisions; it is not where you decide whether a table is a source, seed, migration target, or excluded object.

ad-migration setup-target
ad-migration setup-target --source-schema bronze

setup-target:

• writes target runtime state into manifest.json
• scaffolds the dbt/ project
• writes the dbt profile used by downstream validation
• generates staging source metadata from confirmed source tables
• generates pass-through stg_bronze__<entity> wrappers for confirmed source tables
• exports confirmed seed tables as dbt seed CSVs
• creates any missing target-side source tables
• validates the generated staging/source setup artifacts

Before running target setup, extracted tables should have one of these outcomes:

• scoped to a writer and still in the migration pipeline
• confirmed as a source with ad-migration add-source-table <fqn>
• confirmed as a seed with ad-migration add-seed-table <fqn>
• excluded with ad-migration exclude-table <fqn>

Only confirmed source tables are included in staging source metadata. Writerless tables are not automatically treated as sources.

Target setup validates only the artifacts it generated for the source-facing layer:

• runs dbt seed when seed CSVs were exported
• runs dbt compile for generated staging wrappers
• runs dbt build for generated staging wrappers and source selectors
• excludes dbt unit tests from that build

This validation proves the generated source metadata, staging wrappers, seed files, target profile, and target connection are coherent.

Downstream commands rely on target setup in different ways:

/generate-model does not run a broad dbt build for each generated mart model. It compiles the generated model, materializes direct parents with an empty run when unit tests need them, then runs scoped dbt unit tests.

/refactor-mart uses candidate-scoped validation from the approved refactor-mart plan. Those validation commands commonly use dbt build --select <model-or-scope>.

Rerun ad-migration setup-target after changing source or seed decisions. It refreshes staging source metadata and seed files, then creates only missing target-side source tables.

Target setup is guarded once downstream generated dbt models exist. If you need to change source or seed decisions after model generation, use /status to identify the affected objects and reset or regenerate the downstream state deliberately.

• Status Dashboard
• dbt Scaffolding
• Model Generation
• Sandbox Operations