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DuckDB in Action
Dive into DuckDB and start processing gigabytes of data with ease—all with no data warehouse.
DuckDB is a cutting-edge SQL database that makes it incredibly easy to analyze big data sets right from your laptop. In DuckDB in Action you’ll learn everything you need to know to get the most out of this awesome tool, keep your data secure on prem, and save you hundreds on your cloud bill. From data ingestion to advanced data pipelines, you’ll learn everything you need to get the most out of DuckDB—all through hands-on examples.
Open up DuckDB in Action and learn how
• Read and process data from CSV, JSON and Parquet sources both locally and remote
• Write analytical SQL queries, including aggregations, common table expressions, window functions, special types of joins, and pivot tables
• Use DuckDB from Python, both with SQL and its "Relational"-API, interacting with databases but also data frames
• Prepare, ingest and query large datasets
• Build cloud data pipelines
• Extend DuckDB with custom functionality
Pragmatic and comprehensive, DuckDB in Action introduces the DuckDB database and shows you how to use it to solve common data workflow problems. You won’t need to read through pages of documentation—you’ll learn as you work. Get to grips with DuckDB's unique SQL dialect, learning to seamlessly load, prepare, and analyze data using SQL queries. Extend DuckDB with both Python and built-in tools such as MotherDuck, and gain practical insights into building robust and automated data pipelines.
About the technology
DuckDB makes data analytics fast and fun! You don’t need to set up a Spark or run a cloud data warehouse just to process a few hundred gigabytes of data. DuckDB is easily embeddable in any data analytics application, runs on a laptop, and processes data from almost any source, including JSON, CSV, Parquet, SQLite and Postgres.
About the book
DuckDB in Action guides you example-by-example from setup, through your first SQL query, to advanced topics like building data pipelines and embedding DuckDB as a local data store for a Streamlit web app. You’ll explore DuckDB’s handy SQL extensions, get to grips with aggregation, analysis, and data without persistence, and use Python to customize DuckDB. A hands-on project accompanies each new topic, so you can see DuckDB in action.
What's inside
• Prepare, ingest and query large datasets
• Build cloud data pipelines
• Extend DuckDB with custom functionality
• Fast-paced SQL From simple queries to advanced analytics
About the reader
For data pros comfortable with Python and CLI tools.
About the author
Mark Needham is a blogger and video creator at @?LearnDataWithMark. Michael Hunger leads product innovation for the Neo4j graph database. Michael Simons is a Java Champion, author, and Engineer at Neo4j.
DuckDB is a cutting-edge SQL database that makes it incredibly easy to analyze big data sets right from your laptop. In DuckDB in Action you’ll learn everything you need to know to get the most out of this awesome tool, keep your data secure on prem, and save you hundreds on your cloud bill. From data ingestion to advanced data pipelines, you’ll learn everything you need to get the most out of DuckDB—all through hands-on examples.
Open up DuckDB in Action and learn how
• Read and process data from CSV, JSON and Parquet sources both locally and remote
• Write analytical SQL queries, including aggregations, common table expressions, window functions, special types of joins, and pivot tables
• Use DuckDB from Python, both with SQL and its "Relational"-API, interacting with databases but also data frames
• Prepare, ingest and query large datasets
• Build cloud data pipelines
• Extend DuckDB with custom functionality
Pragmatic and comprehensive, DuckDB in Action introduces the DuckDB database and shows you how to use it to solve common data workflow problems. You won’t need to read through pages of documentation—you’ll learn as you work. Get to grips with DuckDB's unique SQL dialect, learning to seamlessly load, prepare, and analyze data using SQL queries. Extend DuckDB with both Python and built-in tools such as MotherDuck, and gain practical insights into building robust and automated data pipelines.
About the technology
DuckDB makes data analytics fast and fun! You don’t need to set up a Spark or run a cloud data warehouse just to process a few hundred gigabytes of data. DuckDB is easily embeddable in any data analytics application, runs on a laptop, and processes data from almost any source, including JSON, CSV, Parquet, SQLite and Postgres.
About the book
DuckDB in Action guides you example-by-example from setup, through your first SQL query, to advanced topics like building data pipelines and embedding DuckDB as a local data store for a Streamlit web app. You’ll explore DuckDB’s handy SQL extensions, get to grips with aggregation, analysis, and data without persistence, and use Python to customize DuckDB. A hands-on project accompanies each new topic, so you can see DuckDB in action.
What's inside
• Prepare, ingest and query large datasets
• Build cloud data pipelines
• Extend DuckDB with custom functionality
• Fast-paced SQL From simple queries to advanced analytics
About the reader
For data pros comfortable with Python and CLI tools.
About the author
Mark Needham is a blogger and video creator at @?LearnDataWithMark. Michael Hunger leads product innovation for the Neo4j graph database. Michael Simons is a Java Champion, author, and Engineer at Neo4j.
566 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 10, 2024
7 people are currently reading
24 people want to read
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Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
January 19, 2025
Good tech, unimpressive book.
Yes, it does equip you with the basic knowledge (how to install, how to run the query, how to connect from your fav programming language, how to integrate with BI, how to import some data), but it fails (or rather skips or skims quickly) where you need expertise most:
- designing schemas for various scenarios
- in-depth analysis of query plans (there's a dedicated chapter on that, but frankly - it feels very rushed and I didn't learn much there)
- troubleshooting/optimization
- monitoring (observability)
- upscaling
In exchange, you get a chapter on Motherduck, which seems more like a bit of marketing than actual value ... 2.5 stars, rounded up, because it's the only book on DuckDB I know.
Yes, it does equip you with the basic knowledge (how to install, how to run the query, how to connect from your fav programming language, how to integrate with BI, how to import some data), but it fails (or rather skips or skims quickly) where you need expertise most:
- designing schemas for various scenarios
- in-depth analysis of query plans (there's a dedicated chapter on that, but frankly - it feels very rushed and I didn't learn much there)
- troubleshooting/optimization
- monitoring (observability)
- upscaling
In exchange, you get a chapter on Motherduck, which seems more like a bit of marketing than actual value ... 2.5 stars, rounded up, because it's the only book on DuckDB I know.
March 11, 2025
A useful overview of DuckDB. Enough to get you started, and the book does a good job of highlighting what makes DuckDB different from other databases. The last several chapters include irrelevant things like introductions to Dagster and Superset. I wish those chapters had instead been dedicated to more in-depth features of DuckDB.
July 24, 2025
This book is readable and covers a fair amount of ground, but ultimately it's kind of shallow to my tastes. It only gets into what I consider the meat of the matter in the last two chapters and the appendix. I like database books that start with the architecture before going into the use cases. It also didn't talk at all about writing extensions, which when dealing with an extendable DBMS is one of the most interesting things you could cover. It also spends too much time on specific tool sets that a particular user might or might not actual use. And the focus on Python is, I suspect, not the kind of thing that will age well.
It does do a nice job of covering DuckDB's rather idiosyncratic dialect if SQL though.
It does do a nice job of covering DuckDB's rather idiosyncratic dialect if SQL though.
September 16, 2024
It is a comprehensive guide to learn about DuckDB and has a lot practical examples. It is an invaluable resource for data professionals seeking to harness DuckDB's power
January 11, 2025
Excellent dive into the capabilities of DuckDB. It's both highly informative and approachable, touching on a vast array of topics and use cases.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews