Feature Request: Global Queries/Global Query Folder

[jtelcontar]

I very often find myself saving queries that I might want to run globally across all of the RDS servers I connect to-- queries to check table index usage patterns, query to see all triggers, query to see non-idle processes, query to see all processes, etc. But also queries specific to our particular database, which are relevant for all clients and could be useful for debugging.

I have them saved in the "Queries" panel so I don't have to copy/paste them every time, but they only exist on whatever database connection I originally used them on.

So then I have to remember to copy/paste them over to the various other connections. And if I make changes, I then have to also remember to copy again. I also run into the issue of forgetting which connection I used that really awesome query on 3 months ago-- and then have to go through them all to find it (maybe not an issue if you only connect to 1-2 different servers, but I'm looking at 12-13 right now).

It would be awesome to have a designated "Global Queries" folder into which I could place all of these saved queries. And then that folder could be available across all database connections. Or even better, allow a query folder to be specified as a "global" folder, so you could have multiple if you wanted.

[ehamberg]

Not a full solution, but if you drag a folder into the Queries panel, you'll get a reference to the folder and can expand it to show the query files inside.

Since it's a reference, changes to files inside will be visible in other connections that also has a reference to the folder.

(As a bonus: If that folder lives in iCloud Drive/Dropbox/etc, you can also share it between machines.)

[jtelcontar]

Not a full solution, but if you drag a folder into the Queries panel, you'll get a reference to the folder and can expand it to show the query files inside.

Since it's a reference, changes to files inside will be visible in other connections that also has a reference to the folder.

(As a bonus: If that folder lives in iCloud Drive/Dropbox/etc, you can also share it between machines.)

Ohhhhh very interesting, I didn't know this! Thanks @ehamberg, I'll give that a try in the meanwhile.

[jakob]

I've been thinking about shared queries for a long time, since people have been asking for this feature for a long time. I'm just not sure how to best implement it.

The "referenced file/folder" feature is one approach we implemented early on, it seemed like a convenient feature, but to be honest I don't even use it much myself, it's just one of these features that sounded more useful than it actually is.

If you open two Postico windows with different servers, you can even drag folders/files from on sidebar to the other to create references. We spent a lot of time on this feature, I believe that it can cover a lot of use cases, but it's not very intuitive and it feels like a workaround.

I think the best way to do it would be to allow marking queries / folders in the sidebar as "shared". Either make them global, or shared between all the servers in a server group/folder, which is useful if you use folders to organise your servers.

One of the (minor) issues that is holding me back is that I'm not even sure how I would name the feature. "Shared Queries" could imply that it's for sharing with other people, "Global Queries" only covers the use case where you share it with all other servers...

Anyway, I just wanted to say it's a good idea, and it's something I've been thinking about for a long time. Maybe I should just get started working on an implementation and see if it is useful.