The SQLite command line interface has a handy little feature where you can open your SQL query results in an Excel file.
When you run a query, instead of the query being output to your console as it normally would, it instead opens as an Excel spreadsheet (or LibreOffice, or whatever program your system uses to open CSV files).
You have two options when doing this:
This article covers both options.
The SQLite command line interface allows you to use various modes for formatting the result set of SQL queries. For example, you can format the results in columns, as a comma separated list, using vertical output, and more.
This article explains how to use the .mode dot command to format your results as a tab-separated list.
One of the values you can provide to the .mode dot command when using the SQLite command line shell is line.
Using .mode line outputs the query results using vertical output. What I mean is that, each column is displayed on a new line. The column name is displayed, along with an equals sign and then the column’s value.
SQLite has several modes and settings that enable you to output query results as a comma-separated list.
For example, you can use the .separator dot command to specify a comma as the separator. Or you could use the “quote” mode to format the output as string literals.
However, for the purposes of this article, I’m going to use csv mode, which formats the results as a comma-separated list, as well as with double quotes around strings. Internal double quotes are double-quoted.
When working with the SQLite command line shell, you have the option of having your query results formatted as string literals.
You can do this by switching to “quote” mode. When you do this, strings are enclosed in single-quotes and internal single-quotes are escaped by doubling. Also, blobs are displayed in hexadecimal blob literal notation, numbers are displayed as ASCII text, and NULL values are shown as “NULL”.
If you need to format your results with double quotes, consider using csv mode.
By default, the SQLite command line shell formats query output as a pipe-separated list, without column headers.
If you need to output the results using commas instead of the pipe-symbol, you can specify this with the .separator dot command.
If you need to format your results as string literals, see How to Enclose Strings in Single Quotes. Or if you need any strings to be enclosed in double quotes, see How to Format Results as CSV.