Use External Catalog to query data stored in external sources—no external tables required.
Prerequisites
Before you begin, ensure that you have:
A StarRocks instance. See Instance connection.
Different types of External Catalogs created in your cluster
Query external data
Step 1: Connect to the StarRocks instance
Connect to your StarRocks instance.
Step 2: Locate your External Catalog
List all catalogs in the cluster:
SHOW CATALOGS;List the databases in your target catalog:
SHOW DATABASES FROM <catalog_name>;
Step 3: Query external data
Choose either approach based on your use case.
Single-catalog queries
Switch to the target catalog and database, then run your query with a short table name:
USE <catalog_name>.<db_name>;
SELECT * FROM <table_name>;Cross-catalog queries
Use a fully-qualified three-part name to query tables across multiple catalogs in a single statement—no USE needed:
SELECT * FROM <catalog_name>.<db_name>.<table_name>;Example
The following example queries hive_db.hive_table through a Hive Catalog named hive1.
Option 1: Switch context, then query
USE hive1.hive_db;
SELECT * FROM hive_table LIMIT 1;Option 2: Fully-qualified name
SELECT * FROM hive1.hive_db.hive_table LIMIT 1;What's next
To create more External Catalogs for other data sources, see the External Catalog creation documentation for your data source type.