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Installation

dbc is installable on the most common platforms and from a variety of sources.

Standalone Installer

We provide an automated command-line installer for users who prefer it. Please continue reading for other installation methods.

The following commands will automatically install the latest version of dbc suitable for your system and place it in a standard location for you.

To automatically install dbc, run:

$ curl -LsSf https://dbc.columnar.tech/install.sh | sh

If your system doesn't have curl you can also use wget:

$ wget -q0- https://dbc.columnar.tech/install.sh | sh

If you want to inspect the script before use, you can simply run:

$ curl -LsSf https://dbc.columnar.tech/install.sh | less

Use irm to download the script and execute it with iex:

$ powershell -ExecutionPolicy ByPass -c "irm https://dbc.columnar.tech/install.ps1 | iex"

Changing the execution policy allows running a script from the internet.

Of course, you can also inspect the script before use:

$ powershell -c "irm https://dbc.columnar.tech/install.ps1 | more"

PyPI

dbc is published on PyPI as dbc for convenience. The package contains the appropriate dbc executable for your system and makes it available to various tools in the Python ecosystem.

uv

To run dbc with uv, you can run either of the following:

$ uv tool run dbc
$ uvx dbc

To install dbc as a uv tool, run:

$ uv tool install dbc
$ # Now run dbc with
$ dbc

To learn more about uv tool, see uv's Tools documentation.

pipx

To install dbc with pipx, run,

$ pipx install dbc

If you only want to run dbc to test it out, run,

$ pipx run dbc

Virtual Environment

Installing dbc inside a virtual environment automatically handles installing dbc and adding it to your $PATH:

$ python -m venv .venv
$ source .venv/bin/activate
$ pip install dbc

GitHub Releases

All dbc release artifacts are can be found at GitHub Releases. We always recommend installing dbc from the latest release.

Windows Installer

A Windows MSI installer for x86_64 (i.e., x64, amd64) systems can be found as artifacts in our GitHub Releases. You can also download the latest installer using the following URL:

Architecture Link
x64 https://dbc.columnar.tech/latest/dbc-latest-x64.msi

WinGet

On Windows, you can install dbc using WinGet:

$ winget install dbc

Docker

We publish Docker images for each dbc release.

Run the latest version of dbc under Docker by running:

$ docker run --rm -it columnar/dbc:latest --help

Available Images

The following distroless images are available for Linux-based amd64 and arm64 architectures:

  • columnar/dbc:latest
  • columnar/dbc:{major}, e.g. columnar/dbc:1
  • columnar/dbc:{major}.{minor}, e.g. columnar/dbc:0.1
  • columnar/dbc:{major}.{minor}.{patch}, e.g. columnar/dbc:0.0.1

Homebrew

dbc is available via the Columnar Homebrew tap. The tap will first need to be added to your environment:

$ brew tap columnar-tech/tap

Once you've done this you can install the dbc cask:

$ brew install --cask dbc

Shell Completions

dbc can generate shell completions for a number of common shells.

Note

If you aren't sure what shell you're running, you can run the following command in your terminal:

$ echo $SHELL

$ echo 'eval "$(dbc completion bash)"' >> ~/.bashrc

$ echo 'eval "$(dbc completion zsh)"' >> ~/.zshrc

$ dbc completion fish > ~/.config/fish/completions/dbc.fish

Info

You can use the dbc completion subcommand to print extended instructions for your shell, including how to enable your shell's completion mechanism. For example, to print setup instructions for Bash, run dbc completion bash --help.

Uninstallation

To remove dbc from your system, run the uninstall command corresponding to your installation method.

$ rm $HOME/.local/bin/dbc

$ powershell.exe -c "rm $HOME/.local/bin/dbc.exe"

Go to Settings > Apps > Installed apps (or Control Panel > Programs and Features), select dbc, and click Uninstall.

$ winget uninstall dbc

$ uv tool uninstall dbc

$ pipx uninstall dbc

$ pip uninstall dbc

$ brew uninstall --cask dbc

Note

Uninstalling dbc does not remove any drivers you've installed with either dbc install or dbc sync. To remove drivers, run dbc uninstall on each installed driver prior to uninstalling dbc.