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Quay

Quickstart

You should get from “downloaded Quay” to “running queries” in under a minute. If anything takes longer that’s a bug — please file it from Settings → Feedback in the app (sends straight to triage with diagnostics attached) or email quay@uncle-z.com.

1. Open Quay

Section titled “1. Open Quay”

After install, launch from your apps folder. The Welcome screen offers three tracks:

  • Connect — open a connection profile (this guide)
  • Restore — point at a .sql / .qenc dump and import it
  • Open file — drag a .sql file into the editor

2. Add a connection

Section titled “2. Add a connection”

Click + Add connection in the left rail. Pick your engine — start with Postgres if you’re undecided.

Name        my-postgres
Host        localhost
Port        5432
User        postgres
Password    ••••••••
Database    postgres
SSL         disable (for local; require for cloud)
Tag         dev   ← important — `prod` triggers extra confirmations

Hit Test to verify creds, then Save.

3. Open a session

Section titled “3. Open a session”

Double-click the connection in the rail. Quay opens a session pane with three columns: schema browser (left), SQL editor (centre), result grid (right).

4. Run a query

Section titled “4. Run a query”
SELECT version();

⌘↵ (Mac) or Ctrl+↵ (Win/Linux) runs the active statement. Results render in the right column.

5. Try edit-as-draft

Section titled “5. Try edit-as-draft”

Pick any table → Browse. Edit a cell. Notice the amber dot in the breadcrumb — that’s a pending edit. Edit another cell. Now ⌘S:

  • Non-prod (your dev-tagged connection) → review modal opens showing the diff. Click Commit.
  • Prod-tagged → review modal also asks you to type the connection name to confirm. See Confirmation rules.

6. Take your first backup

Section titled “6. Take your first backup”

⌘⇧B (or File → Backup database). Quay opens the backup dialog:

  • FK-aware ordering (pre-flight inspects KEY_COLUMN_USAGE)
  • Charset / collation preserved at every level
  • AUTO_INCREMENT / sequence values preserved
  • Single transactional snapshot (--single-transaction style for MySQL; BEGIN; ... REPEATABLE READ for Postgres)

Output goes to ~/Documents/Quay Backups/<connection>/<stamp>.sql by default. See Backup + restore for every option.

What’s next

Section titled “What’s next”