How do you perform the equivalent of Oracle's DESCRIBE TABLE in PostgreSQL with psql command?

 

In PostgreSQL, you can use the \d command within the psql command-line tool to get information about a table, similar to Oracle's DESCRIBE TABLE command. Here's how you can use it with an example:

1. Connect to PostgreSQL:

   Open a terminal window and use the psql command to connect to your PostgreSQL database. Replace your_database with the actual name of your database, and provide the appropriate credentials.

   sh

psql -h localhost -U your_username -d your_database

Use the \d Command:

Once connected to the database, you can use the \d command followed by the table name to get information about that table. For example, to get information about a table named employees, you can run:

sql

2. \d employees
   

   This will display information about the employees table, including its columns, data types, constraints, and indexes.

Here's an example output of using the \d command:

sql

Table "public.employees"
 Column  |         Type          | Collation | Nullable | Default
---------+-----------------------+-----------+----------+---------
 emp_id  | integer               |           | not null |
 emp_name| character varying(50) |           |          |
 emp_age | integer               |           |          |
Indexes:
    "employees_pkey" PRIMARY KEY, btree (emp_id)

The output includes information about the columns, data types, constraints, and indexes associated with the table.

Remember to replace your_username, your_database, and employees with your actual values. The \d command is a useful tool for quickly inspecting the structure of tables in PostgreSQL from the command line.