EXTERNAL_TABLES view¶

This Information Schema view displays a row for each external table in the specified (or current) database.

See also:: COLUMNS view , VIEWS view

Columns¶

Column Name	Data Type	Description
TABLE_CATALOG	TEXT	Database that the table belongs to
TABLE_SCHEMA	TEXT	Schema that the table belongs to
TABLE_NAME	TEXT	Name of the table
TABLE_OWNER	TEXT	Name of the role that owns the table
CREATED	TIMESTAMP_LTZ	Creation time of the table
LAST_ALTERED	TIMESTAMP_LTZ	Date and time the object was last altered by a DML, DDL, or background metadata operation. See Usage Notes.
LAST_DDL	TIMESTAMP_LTZ	Timestamp of the last DDL operation performed on the table or view. All supported table/view DDL operations update this field: { CREATE \| ALTER \| DROP \| UNDROP } TABLE { CREATE \| ALTER \| DROP } VIEW All ALTER TABLE operations update this field, including setting or unsetting a table parameter (for example, COMMENT, DATA_RETENTION_TIME, etc.) and changes to table columns (ADD / MODIFY / RENAME / DROP). For more information, see the Usage Notes.
LAST_DDL_BY	TEXT	The current username for the user who executed the last DDL operation. If the user has been dropped, shows `DROPPED_USER(<id>)`. For dropped users, you can join the `<id>` with the USER_ID column in the USERS view.
AUTO_CLUSTERING_ON	BOOLEAN	Whether automatic clustering is enabled for the table
COMMENT	TEXT	Comment for this table
LOCATION	TEXT	External stage where the files containing data to be read are staged
FILE_FORMAT_NAME	TEXT	Named file format that describes the staged data files to scan when querying the external table
FILE_FORMAT_TYPE	TEXT	Format type of the staged data files to scan when querying the external table

Usage notes¶

The view only displays objects for which the current role for the session has been granted access privileges. The view does not honor the MANAGE GRANTS privilege and consequently may show less information compared to a SHOW command when both are executed by a user who holds the MANAGE GRANTS privilege.
The view does not include external tables that have been dropped.
To view only external tables in your queries, filter using a WHERE clause, e.g.:

... WHERE table_schema != 'INFORMATION_SCHEMA'
The LAST_ALTERED column is updated when the following operations are performed on an object:
- DDL operations.
- DML operations (for tables only). This column is updated even when no rows are affected by the DML statement.
- Background maintenance operations on metadata performed by Snowflake.
For views and tables, use the LAST_DDL column for the last modification time for an object.
The value in the LAST_DDL column is updated as follows:
- When a table or view is created, the LAST_DDL timestamp is the same as the CREATED timestamp.
- When a table or view is dropped, the LAST_DDL timestamp is the same as the DELETED timestamp.
- Last DDL data is not available for operations that occurred before the columns were added. The new DDL fields contain null until a DDL operation is executed.
- For replicated databases, the LAST_DDL and LAST_DDL_BY fields are only updated for objects in the primary database. After failover, the LAST_DDL and LAST_DDL_BY fields are updated for DDL operations for the tables and views in the newly promoted primary database. These fields will remain unchanged for objects in the now secondary database.
- For objects in secondary databases that are newly created during a refresh operation, these fields are null.
The LAST_ALTERED column does not necessarily indicate the last refreshed time for external tables. To retrieve the last refreshed time for an auto-refreshed external table, you can use the SYSTEM$EXTERNAL_TABLE_PIPE_STATUS function, which returns information such as the timestamp of the last file Snowflake has registered.

Examples¶

Retrieve the list of all external tables in all schemas in the mydatabase database:

SELECT table_name, last_altered FROM mydatabase.information_schema.external_tables;

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