DESCRIBE SNAPSHOT¶

Note

This operation is not currently covered by the Service Level set forth in Snowflake’s Support Policy and Service Level Agreement.

Describes the properties of a snapshot.

DESCRIBE can be abbreviated to DESC.

See also:

CREATE SNAPSHOT , ALTER SNAPSHOT, DROP SNAPSHOT, SHOW SNAPSHOTS

Syntax¶

{ DESC | DESCRIBE } SNAPSHOT <name>
Copy

Parameters¶

name

Specifies the identifier for the snapshot to describe.

If the identifier contains spaces or special characters, the entire string must be enclosed in double quotes. Identifiers enclosed in double quotes are also case-sensitive.

For more information, see Identifier requirements.

Output¶

The output of the command includes the following columns, which describe the properties and metadata of the object:

Column

Description

name

Name of the snapshot.

state

One of the following values, which indicates the current status of the snapshot:

  • INITIALIZED: The snapshot creation is in progress.

  • CREATED: The snapshot is created and can be used to create a volume.

  • ERROR: Snapshot creation failed.

database_name

Database in which the snapshot is created.

schema_name

Schema in which the snapshot is created.

service_name

Fully qualified service name from which the snapshot is created.

volume_name

Volume from the specified service instance for which the snapshot is created.

instance

ID of the service instance.

size

Size (in GB) of the snapshot.

comment

General comment about the snapshot.

owner

Role that owns the snapshot.

owner_role_type

The type of role that owns the object, either ROLE or DATABASE_ROLE.

created_on

Date and time when the snapshot was created.

Access control requirements¶

A role used to execute this SQL command must have the following privileges at a minimum:

Privilege

Object

Notes

OWNERSHIP or USAGE

Snapshot

OWNERSHIP is a special privilege on an object that is automatically granted to the role that created the object, but can also be transferred using the GRANT OWNERSHIP command to a different role by the owning role (or any role with the MANAGE GRANTS privilege).

Note that operating on any object in a schema also requires the USAGE privilege on the parent database and schema.

For instructions on creating a custom role with a specified set of privileges, see Creating custom roles.

For general information about roles and privilege grants for performing SQL actions on securable objects, see Overview of Access Control.

Usage notes¶

  • To post-process the output of this command, you can use the RESULT_SCAN function, which treats the output as a table that can be queried.

Examples¶

The following example describes the snapshot named my_snapshot:

DESC SNAPSHOT my_snapshot;
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Output:

+-------------+---------+---------------+-------------+------------------------------------+-------------+----------+------+-----------------+-----------+-----------------+-------------------------------+-------------------------------+
| name        | state   | database_name | schema_name | service_name                       | volume_name | instance | size | comment         | owner     | owner_role_type | created_on                    | updated_on                    |
|-------------+---------+---------------+-------------+------------------------------------+-------------+----------+------+-----------------+-----------+-----------------+-------------------------------+-------------------------------|
| MY_SNAPSHOT | CREATED | TUTORIAL_DB   | DATA_SCHEMA | TUTORIAL_DB.DATA_SCHEMA.MY_SERVICE | block-vol1  | 0        |   10 | updated comment | TEST_ROLE | ROLE            | 2023-12-13 17:06:04.162 -0800 | 2023-12-13 17:06:56.303 -0800 |
+-------------+---------+---------------+-------------+------------------------------------+-------------+----------+------+-----------------+-----------+-----------------+-------------------------------+-------------------------------+
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