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squint

A fast SQL linter for dbt and Jinja SQL files, written in Rust. Modelled on sqlfluff and sqlfmt, with first-class Jinja support and a focus on speed.

Features

  • 36 rules covering capitalisation, layout, aliasing, references, structure, and more
  • Auto-fix — rewrite files in place with --fix, or check for drift with --check
  • Jinja-aware — tokenises {{ }} and {% %} blocks without stripping them
  • -- noqa suppression — per-line and per-rule (-- noqa: CP01,LT05)
  • -- fmt: off blocks — opt out of formatting for hand-crafted sections
  • Severity levels — configure rules as error (exit 1) or warning (exit 0)
  • JSON output — for CI dashboards, editor plugins, and scripts
  • LSP server — real-time diagnostics in VS Code, Neovim, Helix, and any LSP client
  • Fast — ~100 µs to lint a 240-line file; 64 files in ~1.4 ms on a modern laptop

Design philosophy

The linter enforces lowercase SQL by default — keywords, function names, type names, boolean/null literals, and unquoted identifiers. This matches the style used by sqlfmt and is the default for most dbt projects. All capitalisation rules are auto-fixable.

The linter has no AST — it operates on a flat token list produced by a Logos-based DFA tokeniser. This keeps the architecture simple and makes it easy to add new rules.

Getting help