oam/knowledge base/snowflake/cli.md

Snowflake CLI

Refer Snowflake CLI.

Meant to replace the SnowSQL tool.

1. TL;DR
2. Setup
3. Further readings

TL;DR

Setup

# Using Homebrew
brew install 'snowflake-cli'
# Get it from the [Snowflake CLI repository]
curl --continue-at '-' --location --fail --show-error --remote-name \
  --url 'https://sfc-repo.snowflakecomputing.com/snowflake-cli/linux_aarch64/3.7.2/snowflake-cli-3.7.2.aarch64.deb' \
&& sudo dpkg -i 'snowflake-cli-3.7.2.aarch64.deb'
curl --continue-at '-' --location --fail --show-error --remote-name \
  --url 'https://sfc-repo.snowflakecomputing.com/snowflake-cli/linux_aarch64/3.7.2/snowflake-cli-3.7.2.aarch64.rpm' \
&& sudo rpm -i 'snowflake-cli-3.7.2.rpm'

# Configure for the session via environment variables
export SNOWFLAKE_ACCOUNT='ABCDEFG-YZ01234' SNOWFLAKE_USER='JDOE' SNOWFLAKE_PASSWORD='SuperSecur3Pa$$word'
export SNOWFLAKE_CLI_LOGS_PATH='/Users/jondoe/snowcli_logs' SNOWFLAKE_DEFAULT_CONNECTION_NAME='myconnection'

Usage

# Check it works.
snow --version

# Get help.
snow --help
snow helpers -h

# List configured connections to Snowflake.
snow connection list

# Add connections.
snow connection add
snow --config-file 'my_config.toml' connection add \
  -n 'myconnection2' --account 'myaccount2' --user 'jdoe2' --no-interactive

# Test connections.
snow connection test
snow connection test -c 'connection-name'
snow connection test --temporary-connection --account 'account-id' --username 'login-name' --password 'password-or-pat'
snow --config-file='my_config.toml' connection test -c 'myconnection2' --enable-diag --diag-log-path "$HOME/report"

# Set the default connection
snow connection set-default 'myconnection2'

# Executes Snowflake queries.
snow sql

Real world use cases

# Test credentials
snow connection test --temporary-connection --account 'ABCDEFG-YZ01234' --username 'JDOE' --password '<PAT>'
SNOWFLAKE_ACCOUNT='ABCDEFG-YZ01234' SNOWFLAKE_USER='JDOE' SNOWFLAKE_PASSWORD='SuperSecur3Pa$$word' snow \
  connection test --temporary-connection

# Execute SQL
snow sql --temporary-connection \
  --account 'ABCDEFG-YZ01234' --username 'REDASH_SERVICE_USER' --role 'ANALYST_FR' --warehouse 'REDASH_WH' \
  --password 'ey…W3.ey…1Z.wT…F4--8N…gV-91L_C3…me_tGQf' \
  --query 'SELECT * FROM VENDORS limit 1;'

Setup

Install the package from the Snowflake CLI repository.

# Linux
# DEB
curl --continue-at '-' --location --fail --show-error --remote-name \
  --url 'https://sfc-repo.snowflakecomputing.com/snowflake-cli/linux_aarch64/3.7.2/snowflake-cli-3.7.2.aarch64.deb' \
&& sudo dpkg -i 'snowflake-cli-3.7.2.aarch64.deb'
# RPM
curl --continue-at '-' --location --fail --show-error --remote-name \
  --url 'https://sfc-repo.snowflakecomputing.com/snowflake-cli/linux_aarch64/3.7.2/snowflake-cli-3.7.2.aarch64.rpm' \
&& sudo rpm -i 'snowflake-cli-3.7.2.rpm'

# Mac OS X
# Via Homebrew
brew install 'snowflake-cli'
# Via the [Snowflake CLI repository]
curl --continue-at '-' --location --fail --show-error --remote-name \
  --url 'https://sfc-repo.snowflakecomputing.com/snowflake-cli/darwin_arm64/3.7.2/snowflake-cli-3.7.2-darwin-arm64.pkg' \
&& sudo installer -pkg 'snowflake-cli-3.7.2-darwin-arm64.pkg' -target '/' \
&& ln -swiv '/Applications/SnowflakeCLI.app/Contents/MacOS/snow' "$HOME/bin/snow"

Refer Configuring Snowflake CLI and Managing Snowflake connections for the configuration.

Snowflake CLI uses a global configuration file to configure connections and logs.
The CLI looks for:

• The file specified by the --config-file option.

• A config.toml file in the location specified by the SNOWFLAKE_HOME environment variable, if set.

• The ~/.snowflake/config.toml file, if such directory exists.

• The config.toml file in the one of the following locations, based on one's operating system:

  • Linux: $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/snowflake/config.toml.
  • Windows: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\snowflake\config.toml
  • Mac OS X: ~/Library/Application Support/snowflake/config.toml

If the global configuration file does not exist, running any snow command for the first time automatically creates an empty config.toml file that one can then populate with the desired connections.

For MacOS and Linux systems, Snowflake CLI requires the configuration file to limit its file permissions to read and write for the file owner only.

chown "$USER" "$HOME/.snowflake/config.toml"
chmod 'u=rw,go=' "$HOME/.snowflake/config.toml"

The configuration supports the following sections:

• [connections], for defining and managing connections.
• [logs], for configuring which types of messages are saved to log files.

A configuration file has the following structure:

[cli.logs]
save_logs = true
level = "info"
path = "/home/john/.snowflake/logs"

[connections.default]
account = "ABCDEFG-YZ01234"
user = "JDOE"
password = "SuperSecur3Pa$$word"
authenticator = "externalbrowser"
role = "PROD_SYSTEM_FR"

One can generate the basic settings for the TOML configuration file in Snowsight.

Important

Should a connection.toml file exist in the same directory as the global configuration file, Snowflake CLI will use the connections defined there instead of the ones in the global config.toml file.

One can also use environment variables to override parameter values defined in the configuration files.
Use the format SNOWFLAKE_<config-section>_<variable>=<value>, where:

• <config_section> is the name of a section in the configuration file, with periods (.) replaced with underscores (_), e.g., CLI_LOGS.
• <variable> is the name of a variable defined in that section, e.g. path.

Examples

# Override the path parameter in the [cli.logs] section in the config.toml file
SNOWFLAKE_CLI_LOGS_PATH='/Users/jondoe/snowcli_logs' snow …

# Set the password for the 'myconnection' connection
SNOWFLAKE_CONNECTIONS_MYCONNECTION_PASSWORD='SomePassword' snow …

# Set the default connection name
SNOWFLAKE_DEFAULT_CONNECTION_NAME='myconnection' snow …

# Test credentials
SNOWFLAKE_ACCOUNT='ABCDEFG-YZ01234' SNOWFLAKE_USER='JDOE' SNOWFLAKE_PASSWORD='SuperSecur3Pa$$word' \
snow connection test --temporary-connection

Further readings

• Snowflake