mjhjmtu

sqlite3 stores command history in .sqlite_history, which is by default created in:

$HOME/.sqlite_history

How can I change this location to somewhere else?

This is possible for example with mysql, where I can define environment variable

MYSQL_HISTFILE=/path/to/whatever/file 

But I could not find any corresponding environment variable for sqlite3

export SQLITE_HISTFILE=/tmp/history 

has no effect. I found a post where somebody asks same question, but no useful answers are given.

It looks like it's hardcoded in line 5576 in shell.c (version 3.14.1):

sqlite3_snprintf(nHistory, zHistory,"%s/.sqlite_history", zHome);

So, to change it, your only option is to edit the source and recompile.

To list some of the possible alternatives,

1. make ~/.sqlite_history into a symbolic link to another file.




2. simply run HOME=/tmp sqlite3 to have the program save the history in /tmp/.sqlite_history, though this assumes you don't need the real home directory inside the command environment.



3. 
   

   edit the binary and replace the string "%s/.sqlite_history", found by Hoov, by another string with the same number of bytes, eg "/tmp/sqlitehistory":

   
   
   

   sed < /usr/bin/sqlite3 's|%s/.sqlite_history|/tmp/sqlitehistory|' >/tmp/sqlite3
   cmp -l /usr/bin/sqlite3 /tmp/sqlite3 # check no extraneous differences
   chmod +x /tmp/sqlite3
   /tmp/sqlite3
   

   
   



4. use the LD_PRELOAD shim I proposed in an another question to change one filename ("/tmp/adb.log" in that case) to another during an open() call.

As of Oct 10, 2018 it appears that a new variable, $SQLITE_HISTORY, was added to address this.