doltlite (Python)

A Python loader for doltlite — Dolt's version control through SQLite's drop-in API.

import doltlite          # one-time bootstrap
import sqlite3

conn = sqlite3.connect("repo.db")
conn.execute("CREATE TABLE t(x INT)")
conn.execute("INSERT INTO t VALUES (1)")
conn.execute("SELECT dolt_commit('-A', '-m', 'init')")

import doltlite makes libdoltlite the active SQLite engine for the current interpreter, so anything that uses the standard sqlite3 module — including SQLAlchemy with sqlite:///... URLs — transparently gains dolt_commit, dolt_branch, dolt_merge, dolt_log, dolt_diff_<table>, and the other Dolt SQL functions and virtual tables.

Install

pip install doltlite

Wheels bundle a precompiled libdoltlite for macOS (arm64) and Linux (x86_64, aarch64). No system-level setup required.

Intel Mac wheels aren't shipped in v0.11.x — GitHub's free-tier macos-13 runners queue for hours and block releases. Intel Mac users should build libdoltlite locally and use the DOLTLITE_LIB path below.

For development against a local checkout of doltlite, point DOLTLITE_LIB at your built library instead:

DOLTLITE_LIB=/path/to/libdoltlite.dylib python3 your_script.py

Requirements

The package piggybacks on Python's stdlib sqlite3, which must load SQLite as a shared extension at runtime. The following Pythons work:

  • Distro / system Python (Linux)
  • Homebrew Python (macOS, Linux)
  • pyenv-built Python
  • Conda Python

These do not work because their _sqlite3 is statically linked into the interpreter:

  • python-build-standalone interpreters — the default for uv python install, mise, and Rye

If you use uv, target one of the supported Pythons explicitly:

uv venv --python /opt/homebrew/bin/python3   # or /usr/bin/python3

How the bootstrap works

Doltlite is a SQLite drop-in: it implements the same sqlite3_* C API and adds Dolt-specific functions and virtual tables on top. To use it from Python, libdoltlite has to be loaded ahead of the system libsqlite3 so its symbols win during the dynamic-link symbol-resolution pass that Python's _sqlite3 module triggers when it's first imported.

The mechanics differ by platform:

Linux

ELF flat-namespace symbol resolution: if libdoltlite is loaded into the process with RTLD_GLOBAL before _sqlite3 is loaded, its sqlite3_* symbols enter the global namespace and the later libsqlite3.so lookup finds them first.

import doltlite does ctypes.CDLL(libdoltlite_path, mode=ctypes.RTLD_GLOBAL) in this case — no re-exec required.

If sqlite3 was already imported before doltlite, that boat has sailed: we fall back to re-execing the interpreter with LD_PRELOAD set, so libdoltlite is loaded at process start.

macOS

macOS uses a two-level namespace: _sqlite3.so has an LC_LOAD_DYLIB command bound to a specific libsqlite3.dylib path (e.g. /opt/homebrew/opt/sqlite/lib/libsqlite3.dylib). Plain dlopen / ctypes.CDLL does not redirect that resolution, and DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES alone doesn't either — the inserted library has to have an install_name (LC_ID_DYLIB) that matches the path _sqlite3.so was linked against.

import doltlite does:

  1. Detect that path via otool -L $(python3 -c 'import _sqlite3; print(_sqlite3.__file__)').
  2. Copy libdoltlite to $TMPDIR/.../libsqlite3.dylib (cached per (lib, mtime, install_name)).
  3. Rewrite the shim's install_name with install_name_tool -id <path>.
  4. Re-exec the interpreter with DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES=<shim>.

The two-level lookup then accepts the shim because the install_name matches.

This requires otool and install_name_tool — install Xcode Command Line Tools (xcode-select --install) if missing.

Re-exec caveats

When a re-exec is required (macOS, or Linux-after-sqlite3-loaded), the bootstrap calls os.execvpe with sys.argv. That means the invocation must name a script file we can replay:

  • ✅ python3 my_script.py
  • ✅ python3 -m my_package
  • ❌ python3 -c "import doltlite; ..." — code string isn't in argv
  • ❌ Interactive REPL / Jupyter — there's no script to re-exec

In the unsupported cases the bootstrap raises DoltliteLoadError with a clear workaround: set DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES (macOS) or LD_PRELOAD (Linux) yourself before starting Python.

API

import doltlite

# Side-effect import does the bootstrap automatically. Subsequent
# imports are no-ops thanks to a process-env marker.

# If you want to bootstrap explicitly (e.g. inside a function):
doltlite.bootstrap()

# Find where the loaded libdoltlite came from:
doltlite.libdoltlite_path()  # absolute path

See also

License

Apache License 2.0. See LICENSE.

Project links

Data verified by PyPI on Aug 13, 2026
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Key dates

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Latest release

1 maintainer

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Avatar for timsehn from gravatar.com timsehn

Credits

Author: DoltHub

GitHub Statistics

Data verified by PyPI on Aug 13, 2026
The GitHub source repository was provided by the project maintainers and verified by PyPI at the time of upload. Stars, forks, and open issues/PRs are derived from that repository and have not been independently verified.

License

Apache Software License (Apache-2.0)

Requires

Python >=3.9

Tags

dolt doltlite sqlite version-control database

Classifiers

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