Is it good to update item values in web database in sitecore?

Question

We have to remove one rendering from multiple pages across the site. For that we have created a Powershell script to delete the rendering. Can we run the same powershell script directly on web db and Master db in sitecore, is it suggestable?

Clause: Don't want to perform entire site publishing

Only option which I see is to do the changes in Master DB and do a item level publishing.

Answer 1

It's never recommended to perform any updates in web database directly. If you do this without running exactly the same updates in master database

1. If publish anything in master database later, you'll overwrite your web database changes.
2. If your application depends on indexes like sitecore_web_index, most probably it's using onPublishEndAsync strategy which doesn't trigger index updates if you change items in web database directly.

I think much better option would be to update your powershell script to publish every item it updates.