TablePlus – Modern, Native Tool for Database Management
I work with SQL Server. I really like general multi-db GUI tools like this, but also wonder if one is giving up a lot of power.<p>SQL Server&#x27;s free native tool is SSMS (SQL Server Management Studio), which is one of the most powerful SQL clients I&#x27;ve ever used. (despite my carryover reservations with MS products from the 1980s-90s, SQL Server is indisputably an innovative and solid piece of technology -- MS did something right with their database group). One can interact syntactically with the database via pure SQL, but SSMS lets you access the deep corners of the database quickly via a GUI (SQL is a great <i>query</i> language, but many admin&#x2F;ops tasks are much more easily done via a GUI -- writing SQL every time you want make a simple change is tedious plus nobody remembers the syntax for infrequently used features). Some of the features I use regularly: row&#x2F;column&#x2F;covering index creation, linked servers, user management, live query plans, create&#x2F;alter script generation from existing objects (stored proc, view, index, table, etc.). I&#x27;ve never seen these features exposed in any third party SQL GUI client.<p>Postgres has a bunch of very powerful features too, and I&#x27;ve never seen these exposed in GUI tools.<p>Jetbrains&#x27; DataGrip comes the closest, but because it needs to support lowest common denominator features across databases, it doesn&#x27;t expose deep features either.<p>I wonder if folks are giving up deep feature discovery by using an generic GUI SQL client.<p>Exception: Oracle SQL Developer. It&#x27;s native to Oracle but is quite unpleasant to use.