SHOW CREATE TABLE

Enterprise command reference.

Command Snapshot

Field	Value
Category	DDL and Administration
Mutates Data	No
Scope	Statement
Privilege Model	Requires DDL/administrative privilege according to target object scope.

Purpose

Executes the SHOW CREATE TABLE SQL command with MonkDB distributed runtime semantics.

Syntax

SHOW CREATE TABLE <schema_name>.<table_name>;

Operational Notes

Use schema-qualified identifiers in automation and automation pipelines.
Validate behavior in staging for cluster-impacting or governance-impacting changes.
Confirm runtime effects through system tables and metrics before and after execution.

When to Use

Use during planned schema and runtime administration changes.
Use in automation pipelines with environment-specific validation and rollback strategy.

When Not to Use

Avoid during incident windows unless the command is part of approved mitigation.
Avoid schema changes in peak traffic windows without staged rollout.

Common Errors and Troubleshooting

Symptom	Likely Cause	Action
Permission denied / unauthorized	Missing privilege on object or cluster scope	Re-run with required grants or elevated admin role.
Analysis/parse error	Syntax variant or object shape mismatch	Compare with canonical syntax and object definition.
Runtime failure under load	Resource limits, breaker pressure, or node state transitions	Check `sys.jobs`, `sys.operations`, `sys.checks`, and retry after mitigation.

Cross-References

Detailed Reference

The SHOW CREATE TABLE statement in MonkDB is a useful SQL command that returns the SQL definition used to create an existing table, including its columns, data types, primary key constraints, partitioning, clustering, generated columns, and other table settings.

This command is extremely helpful when:

You want to inspect the schema of an existing table.
You're reverse engineering a table's definition for backup, documentation, or recreation in another environment.
You're debugging schema-related issues or reviewing how certain table-level options were configured.

It gives you the CREATE TABLE or CREATE FOREIGN TABLE statement that you would use to recreate the same table structure.

SQL Statement

SHOW CREATE TABLE <schema_name>.<table_name>;

Or if you're working in the default monkdb schema:

SHOW CREATE TABLE <table_name>;

PS: MonkDB contains only one schema- monkdb, and the tables, etc are created under it.

Where table_name is the name of the table (optionally schema-qualified) whose schema needs to be displayed.

Key Features

Schema Retrieval: Displays the complete schema of a table, including column definitions, indexes, constraints, and other properties.

Things to Note

Only shows current schema: If a table was altered after creation, the output reflects the latest state.
Doesn’t show data: This is purely about schema, not the contents.
No IF NOT EXISTS or CREATE OR REPLACE: The generated SQL is suitable for fresh creation and schema recreation workflows.

Use Cases

Portability: You can copy the output and use it to recreate the table in another MonkDB cluster.
Versioning Schema: Useful for maintaining schema versions in version control systems.
Auditing: When managing large MonkDB deployments, quickly reviewing table definitions across databases can help spot inconsistencies or misconfigurations.

Example

If you have a table called sensor_data in monkdb schema, and you run:

SHOW CREATE TABLE sensor_data;

You might get something like:

CREATE TABLE "doc"."sensor_data" (
   "id" TEXT,
   "temperature" DOUBLE PRECISION,
   "timestamp" TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE,
   PRIMARY KEY ("id", "timestamp")
)
CLUSTERED INTO 4 SHARDS
PARTITIONED BY ("timestamp")
WITH ("number_of_replicas" = '1');

This tells you: - Table columns and types - Composite primary key (id, timestamp) - It’s clustered into 4 shards - Partitioned by the timestamp column - Replication is set to 1 replica