When working with one of the many modern computer languages that use libraries, one of the many things to be aware of – as a developer – is the version of the libraries available for your usage.
Since there are multiple languages in Snowflake that use libraries, let’s go over how to check out the versions that come installed and how to install one yourself.
SELECT * FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.PACKAGES WHERE LANGUAGE = 'python';
As of the time of this writing, there are 25,477 rows generated from the above query in my version of Snowflake. There are 2,186 distinct libraries in the “normal” version of Snowflake. That is a significant amount of libraries!
Compare that to SQL Server, in which you can also write Python code – meaning anything from SQL Server 2017 and later – you get a paltry 88 default libraries.
There are many great Python libraries in Snowflake that people use daily. The most popular are shown below:
- Pandas – for data manipulation and analysis
- Numpy – for numerical computations
- SciPy – for scientific and technical computing
- scikit-learn – for machine learning and data mining
- snowflake-snowpark-python – for Snowflake-specific operations
- streamlit – for creating interactive web applications
Now, with all of these great libraries, let’s say you find a new one that you’re excited about trying out from within Snowflake. What do we need to get it added?
Well, sadly, you can’t… at least not by yourself.
What you can do, though, is submit it to the Snowflake Ideas page in the Snowflake community. This allows Snowflake to know your feelings and how important certain libraries are to all of its users. It also allows you – the user – to tell Snowflake what other things they should add to their already awesome product. If enough people vote for it, then your awesome idea can come to fruition.
With that, hopefully, you’ve learned a little bit about packages in Snowflake. Things like how to find the packages installed and how to request them. Until next time when we’ll go over more Snowflake fun!
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