Quickstart

This guide walks you through creating your first smelt project.

1. Create a project

mkdir my-project && cd my-project

Create a smelt.yml configuration file:

name: my-project
targets:
  dev:
    type: duckdb
    database: dev.duckdb
    schema: main

2. Write a model

Create a models/ directory and add your first SQL model:

mkdir models

-- models/orders_summary.sql
---
name: orders_summary
materialization: table
---

SELECT
  DATE(order_date) as order_day,
  COUNT(*) as order_count,
  SUM(amount) as total_amount
FROM smelt.ref('raw_orders')
GROUP BY 1

3. Run your models

# Preview what will be executed
smelt run --dry-run --verbose

# Execute all models
smelt run

# Show query results
smelt run --show-results

4. Set up your editor

Install the smelt VSCode extension for syntax highlighting, diagnostics, and go-to-definition support.