sqlite3: dump schema into .sql file from command line

Question

I'm trying to dump the schema for test.db only (i.e. no data) into a file called schema.sql from the command line in OS X without launching sqlite3.

I know I can do:

sqlite3 .open test.db .output schema.sql .schema .quit 

But I don't want to launch sqlite 3. This...

echo '.output schema.sql' | sqlite3 test.db 

creates the empty file but this...

echo '.schema' | sqlite3 test.db 

only prints the schema. How can I write it to that file from Terminal?

Thanks!

Answer 1

The shell allows redirection, and sqlite3 can get the command as a parameter:

sqlite3 test.db .schema > schema.sql 

Answer 2

Figured it out! I just needed to escape the text in the echo statement:

echo -e '.output schema.sql\n.schema' | sqlite3 test.db