ENTERPRISE EDITION FEATURE

SYSTEM HISTORY is an Enterprise Edition feature. Contact Databend Support for a license.

System History Tables

Databend's system history tables provide Data Governance capabilities by automatically tracking database activities for compliance, security monitoring, and performance analysis.

Available Tables

Table	Purpose	Key Use Cases
query_history	Complete SQL execution audit trail	Performance analysis, compliance tracking, usage monitoring
access_history	Data access and modification logs	Data lineage, compliance reporting, change management
login_history	User authentication tracking	Security auditing, failed login monitoring, access pattern analysis
profile_history	Detailed query execution profiles	Performance optimization, resource planning, bottleneck identification
log_history	Raw system logs and events	System troubleshooting, error analysis, operational monitoring

Permissions

Access Restrictions:

• Only SELECT and DROP operations are allowed
• ALTER operations are prohibited for all users
• Ownership cannot be transferred

Required Permissions: To query system history tables, users need one of:

• GRANT SELECT ON *.* (global access)
• GRANT SELECT ON system_history.* (database access)
• GRANT SELECT ON system_history.table_name (table-specific access)

Example:

-- Create audit role for compliance team
CREATE ROLE audit_team;
GRANT SELECT ON system_history.* TO ROLE audit_team;
CREATE USER compliance_officer IDENTIFIED BY 'secure_password' WITH DEFAULT_ROLE='audit_team';
GRANT ROLE audit_team TO USER compliance_officer;

Configuration

Databend Cloud

✅ Automatically enabled - All system history tables are ready to use without any configuration.

Self-Hosted Databend

📝 Manual configuration required - Click to expand configuration details

Minimal Configuration

To enable system history tables, you must configure all 5 tables in your databend-query.toml:

[log.history]
on = true

# All 5 tables must be configured to enable history logging
# retention is optional (default: 168 hours = 7 days)
[[log.history.tables]]
table_name = "query_history"
retention = 168  # Optional: 7 days (default)

[[log.history.tables]]
table_name = "login_history"
retention = 168  # Optional: 7 days (default)

[[log.history.tables]]
table_name = "access_history"
retention = 168  # Optional: 7 days (default)

[[log.history.tables]]
table_name = "profile_history"
retention = 168  # Optional: 7 days (default)

[[log.history.tables]]
table_name = "log_history"
retention = 168  # Optional: 7 days (default)

Custom Storage (Optional)

By default, history tables use your main database storage. To use separate S3 storage:

[log.history]
on = true

[log.history.storage]
type = "s3"

[log.history.storage.s3]
bucket = "your-history-bucket"
root = "history_tables"
endpoint_url = "https://s3.amazonaws.com"
access_key_id = "your-access-key"
secret_access_key = "your-secret-key"

⚠️ Note: When changing storage configuration, existing history tables will be dropped and recreated.

For complete configuration options, see Query Configuration: [log.history] Section.