10bDatasette
Database Management
10 May 2026
SQLite applications
- There are vastly many applications using SQLite
- I just want to show you one, called Datasette
- I picked this carefully for several reasons
- You can become exhausted looking at all the apps there are, so you need one really good one
- This is one that you can probably use, both in your work and in your personal life
- It uses
sqlite3at the terminal, which you’ve been learning—not all sqlite apps do, in fact most hide sqlite
Datasette
- Datasette was written by Simon Willison, a prolific blogger who’s been a software engineer for about 25 years
- But he wanted to create something that anyone could use, without software engineering experience
- He was working as a data journalist at The Guardian, a news outlet with the need to publish a lot of data
- Datasette is a collection, really an ecosystem, of tools for working with “small” data, small being what can fit on a smartphone
How to learn about Datasette
- First, you should watch the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lig2gxPEZPo without going off on any sidetrips to understand the many references
- Then, look at the blog post at https://simonwillison.net/2021/Jul/22/small-data/ where he provides a transcript of the video, along with links and code samples
- The video was made six years ago during COVID—a lot has changed since then
- Luckily, Simon Willison often blogs about the changes in Datasette at https://simonwillison.net/
Some additional notes
- You can easily use Datasette in your final project
- Keep in mind that I don’t necessarily know how you developed your schema, although it would make sense to document that for your future self
- You can present your schema to me by using the sqlite3 .schema command after you’ve developed it and, of course, Datasette can help you develop it
- If your database contains georeferenced data, you can use Datasette to add cluster maps of that data
- There is a lot more you can do if you explore Datasette and, if you have any interest in archives, you should explore Datasette
One additional note
Simon Willison is famous for, among other things, testing LLMs by asking them to draw a picture of a pelican riding on a bicycle, with very interesting results
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