Add support for SQL based registration of external catalogs
Author: pepijnveCreated Sep 9, 2026Updated Sep 18, 2026
Labelsenhancement
Is your feature request related to a problem or challenge?
When using the Datafusion REPL as an exploration tool it can be convenient to connect to an external catalog (e.g. an Iceberg REST catalog) ad hoc using a SQL statement. At the moment this is not possible since ATTACH ... or CREATE EXTERNAL CATALOG ... are not supported. The session state also does not provide any means to register external catalog factories the same way table factories can be registered.
Describe the solution you'd like
Add an equivalent to TableProviderFactory for external catalogs.
Describe alternatives you've considered
No response
Additional context
No response
Source: apache/datafusion