Tutorial: Exploring HeliosDB with SHOW Commands

Level: Basic | Time: 10 minutes | Version: 7.2.0

HeliosDB exposes 100+ administrative SHOW commands that work from any PostgreSQL client.

Connect

psql -h localhost -p 5432 -U admin -d heliosdb

Discover Your Database

-- List all tables
SHOW TABLES;

-- Describe a table's columns
SHOW COLUMNS FROM users;

-- View DDL for a table
SHOW CREATE TABLE users;

-- List all indexes
SHOW INDEXES;

-- List all databases
SHOW DATABASES;

Server Information

-- Version, protocols, status
SHOW SERVER STATUS;

-- All 14 protocol adapters
SHOW PROTOCOLS;

-- Active connections
SHOW CONNECTIONS;

-- All session parameters
SHOW ALL;

Storage Internals

-- LSM engine stats (hot/warm/cold breakdown)
SHOW STORAGE STATUS;

-- Storage tier distribution
SHOW STORAGE TIERS;

-- WAL configuration
SHOW WAL STATUS;

-- Query parse cache stats
SHOW QUERY CACHE;

-- SSTable bloom filter stats
SHOW BLOOM FILTERS;

Clearing Caches

-- Clear query parse cache (useful between benchmarks)
FLUSH QUERY CACHE;

-- Clear scan result cache
FLUSH SCAN CACHE;

-- Clear buffer pool
FLUSH BUFFER POOL;

What’s Next

EXPLAIN Tutorial — Query plan analysis
Redis Protocol — Using HeliosDB as Redis
CDC Events — Change data capture