Rule categories#

Safety (SC-S prefix) — dangerous operations, like UPDATE/DELETE without a WHERE clause and unqualified column references in a join. Example: SC-S01 (error) fires when an UPDATE has no WHERE, because it affects every row.

Naming (SC-N prefix) — identifier conventions. Example: SC-N01 (warn) flags column aliases that aren't snake_case.

Style (SC-T prefix) — cleaner SQL patterns, such as preferring explicit JOIN syntax over the implicit comma-join form.

Performance (SC-P prefix) — patterns that hurt query efficiency, including unbounded sorting and index-preventing predicates.

Antipattern (SC-A prefix) — common mistakes, like comparing against NULL with = instead of IS NULL.

Codegen (SC-C prefix) — validates code-generation annotations and query signatures before they reach the generator.

See the full rule table with every ID for the complete list, defaults, and descriptions.

Configuring severity#

Each rule runs at one of three levels: error (fails the command), warn (reported but the command still passes), or off (disabled). Category-level settings can be overridden per rule:

[lint.categories]
safety = "error"
 
[lint.rules]
"SC-S03" = "off"

The per-rule override under [lint.rules] always wins over the category default.

sqruff integration#

Scythe integrates sqruff for formatting- and style-level rules, surfaced with an SQ- prefix. Configuration lives under [lint.sqruff], where per-rule entries only accept "off". LT01 is excluded by default in both scythe lint and scythe fmt due to an upstream sqruff issue with compound operators.

Related#

• Lint Rule Reference — every SC-* rule ID, default severity, and trigger condition.
• Security Audit — the 35 SC-SEC/SC-RLS/SC-MIG/SC-CHK rules that also run under scythe lint.
• CLI Reference — scythe lint flags, including --fix and --dialect.