SQL history

The SQL history can be accessed from the Run SQL window. Click on the History icon, File > SQL History or Ctrl+H.

This shows you all the SQL statements you have run. The following information is shown:

• time the statement was run
• database the SQL was run against
• the text of the SQL statement
• elapsed time for the query
• whether the query results were saved to disk
• the result message of the query. This will generally be either an error message (if the statement failed) or a message giving the number of rows retrieved.
• where the SQL was run from (see below)

Click on a row to see the full details of the query at the bottom part of the window – this gives the full text of the query and / or error message. The SQL text and result boxes can be resized, in case you need a larger box to see the full text.

• Clicking on Retrieve SQL will retrieve the SQL to the Run SQL window.
• Clicking on Retieve into new Window will open another Run SQL window, and retrieve the SQL into that.
• Copy SQL copies the existing SQL to the Windows clipboard
• Exit leaves the window without retrieving anything.

You can change the order of the columns in the view (drag and drop the column headers). This column order is remembered between AQT sessions.

Viewing saved results

If your Query Results were saved in the Data Display window then a Table icon will be shown in the Saved column. Click on this icon to open the saved query results in a Data Display window.

Run From

You can run SQL from a number of places in AQT. By default, only SQL run from the Run SQL window is recorded in the SQL History. However, in Options > History you can specify to include SQL run:

• the Gui Query Builder
• the Row Update window
• the inline edit feature
• individual statements in the Run Multiple statements window
• the SQL run to retrieve rows from Linked Tables

The menu item Run From allows you to specify which of these SQL statements are shown in the History display.

History Files

Information is (by default) written to aqt_history.txt in your default directory. You can change the directory where the history file(s) are written with Options > File Locations.

AQT holds SQL history indefinitely. If you history file becomes very large it can take a while to open the SQL History window.

If this happens, you should do one of the following:

• purge the history file with File > Purge SQL History
• switch to another history file with Options > History
• use seperate history files per week or month. How to do this is described in Options > History

If you have multiple History files, you can open a particular one with File > Open.

When are history records written?

History records are written to disk as soon as a query is run.

• if AQT crashes or is terminated, you will not lose any history information.
• if you are running multiple AQT sessions, each session will be able to see the history records from the other's session.

AQT writes a maximum of 20,000 bytes of an SQL statement and 1000 bytes of the result message to the history record. If you have a very large SQL statement you may notice that it is truncated when you retrieve it from the History. In this case you should save the SQL statement to disk rather than relying on the History to "save" it.

History and Queries

When your SQL statement is a saved-query (eg. is SQL you have saved or retrieved from disk), the information on the query filename is recorded with the history record. When you click on the SQL in the history grid, the information in the status bar (at the bottom of the window) will tell you the name of this saved query.

When you retrieve the SQL from the History, AQT will associate the query with your SQL:

• AQT will check the query-file to see if it has changed since the history record was written. If so, AQT will ask you whether you want to load the most recent version of the query from disk
• the name of the query will appear in the window caption and status bar of the Run SQL window.
• when you click on Save, AQT will save the query to disk without prompting for the name.

Database

When you retrieve some SQL, AQT will not change the database in the Run SQL window to the database in the history record.

However if you use Retrieve into new Window, AQT will set the database in this new Run SQL window to the database in the History record.

Procedure History

AQT also records the running of Stored Procedures from the Run Procedure window. The history entries for these are recorded in file aqt_prochistory.txt. These history records also includes the parameters passed to the stored procedure; this can be useful when rerunnng a procedure run earlier.

Many of the considerations of these history records are the same as for the SQL History.

Audit Feature

Note that in addition to the SQL History feature, there is also Audit Feature. While this records similar information, the audit feature has a number of different options more oriented to long-term recording of update (non query) activity.