SOAR (SQL Optimizer And Rewriter): Installation, Configuration, and Practical Use Cases

On October 20th, Xiaomi open‑sourced SOAR (SQL Optimizer And Rewriter), a Go‑based tool that checks SQL quality, generates evaluation reports, and helps prevent problematic SQL from reaching production.

Installation : SOAR provides pre‑compiled binaries for various operating systems on GitHub Releases; advanced users can download the source code and compile it as shown in the accompanying screenshots.

Quick Start : After installation, no additional configuration is required—simply run the provided command to produce a Markdown‑formatted SQL review report, which can be used to improve the SQL statements.

Configuration : SOAR uses a YAML configuration file. Most users only need to set a few parameters such as online-dsn , test-dsn , and log-output . Important settings include specifying database environments (online and test) and the allow-online-as-test flag to prevent accidental use of the production database as a test environment.

Output Formats : Besides the default Markdown, SOAR can output results in HTML or JSON. It supports 15 report types (e.g., SQL rewrite, EXPLAIN analysis, fingerprinting, beautification) that can be listed via a command.

Help & Community : For additional configuration details, refer to the project documentation. Issues can be submitted on GitHub, and real‑time assistance is available on Gitter.

Use Cases :

Scenario 1 – Both online and test environments are available; SOAR provides full recommendations, index analysis, EXPLAIN, PROFILE, and comprehensive SQL rewriting.

Scenario 2 – No online environment, only a test environment; SOAR creates a test database from DDL and performs optimization.

Scenario 3 – Neither environment is configured; SOAR operates in a degraded mode, offering heuristic suggestions and limited rewriting, suitable for local linting.

Scenario 4 – Only an online environment is configured and allowed as test; this is discouraged due to potential risks.

References: YAML specification, SOAR GitHub issues, and Gitter community links are provided for further reading.