NOTE: This tool has been replaced by SQLShell. sqlcmd is no longer being actively maintained, though I may apply bug fixes now and then.

sqlcmd is a Python-based SQL command line tool, similar in concept to tools like Oracle's SQL*Plus, the PostgreSQL psql command, and MySQL's mysql tool.

Some Features at a Glance

• Connection parameters for individual databases are kept in a configuration file in your home directory.
• Databases can be assigned multiple logical names.
• Command history management, with GNU Readline support. Each database has its own history file.
• Supports retrieving database metadata (getting a list of tables, querying the table's columns and their data types, listing the indexes and foreign keys for a table, etc.).
• Supports Unix shell-style variables.
• Standard interface that works the same no matter what database you're using.
• Uses the enhanced database drivers in the Grizzled API's db module. (Those drivers are, in turn, built on top of standard Python DB API drivers like psycopg2 and MySQLdb.)
• Supports:
  • MySQL (tested with MySQL 5 on Linux, Mac OS X, and FreeBSD)
  • Oracle (tested with Oracle Database 10g Express Edition for Linux)
  • PostgreSQL (tested with versions 8.1 through 8.3 on Linux and Mac OS X)
  • SQL Server (tested with SQL Server Express 2005, using pymssql)
  • SQLite (tested on Linux and Mac OS X)
  You will have to install Python DB API drivers for all but SQLite.
• Written entirely in Python, which makes it very portable (though the database drivers are often written in C and may not be available on all platforms).

sqlcmd has been tested on the following platforms:

• Mac OS X, version 10.4 (Tiger), using MacPython
• Linux (Ubuntu, Gutsy and Hardy)
• FreeBSD
• Windows XP, using the non-Cygwin Windows version of Python and pyreadline

Installation

The usual:

1. Unpack the tarball or Zip file.
2. Change your directory to the resulting sqlcmd-0.7 directory.
3. Run: python setup.py install

easy_install sqlcmd

easy_install -U sqlcmd

Prerequisites

sqlcmd requires the following:

• Python 2.5 or better
• The Grizzled API (automatically installed if you use easy_install to install sqlcmd)
• The enum module (automatically installed if you use easy_install)
• Appropriate Python DB API drivers for the databases you want to use. See the User's Guide for details.
• Windows only: You'll also want the ipython pyreadline package, available via easy_install or from http://ipython.scipy.org/dist/

Using sqlcmd

Please see the User's Guide.

Source Code Repository

The source code for sqlcmd is maintained on github. To clone the repository, run this command:

git clone git://github.com/bmc/sqlcmd.git

Testimonials

I was hacking away on [a] small consulting project. I was trying to move very quickly, and having problems getting Ruby to play with Postgres. The only thing working fine was SQLite, but I was on some incredibly screwy machine that wouldn't load the prompt, so I couldn't verify any of the data.

+1 sqlcmd — Field tested and verified ass-saver.

     — Mark Chadwick

Author

Brian M. Clapper, <bmc @ clapper . org>

Copyright

© 2008 Brian M. Clapper

License

BSD-style license. See accompanying LICENSE file.