profilesyml

profilesyml, or profiles.yml, is a YAML configuration file used by data tooling to manage database connection profiles. It is most commonly associated with dbt (data build tool), which reads profiles to determine how to connect to data warehouses across environments. The file is typically located in the user’s home directory, under a hidden directory such as ~/.dbt/profiles.yml on Unix-like systems or %USERPROFILE%\.dbt\profiles.yml on Windows.

The file uses a hierarchical structure. It defines one or more profiles. Each profile contains an outputs section and a target key. Outputs is a mapping of named connection configurations (for example dev, prod, test). Each output specifies driver-specific connection details, including type (postgres, redshift, snowflake, bigquery, mysql, sqlserver, etc.), host, port, user, password (or a reference to an environment variable), database, schema, and optional settings such as threads and special options.

Usage: When tools run, they read the profiles.yml file to establish a database connection. The target field selects the default output within a profile. Users can switch targets via environment variables, CLI options, or tool-specific configuration.

Security and maintenance: Credentials are often stored in environment variables or external secret managers to avoid embedding secrets in plain text. It is common to keep non-sensitive parts of profiles.yml under version control while excluding secrets, using separate files or environment-based injections for credentials. Maintain distinct dev and prod profiles to reflect different environments.

Example:

my_profile:

target: dev

outputs:

dev:

type: postgres

host: localhost

port: 5432

user: dbuser

password: ${DB_PASSWORD}

dbname: analytics

schema: public

threads: 4