{"id":21049,"date":"2026-07-25T16:02:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-25T14:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.salvis.com\/blog\/?p=21049"},"modified":"2026-07-25T16:50:41","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T14:50:41","slug":"the-return-of-sqlcls-script-command","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.salvis.com\/blog\/2026\/07\/25\/the-return-of-sqlcls-script-command\/","title":{"rendered":"The Return of SQLcl’s SCRIPT Command"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The script<\/code> command was introduced with SQLcl 4.2. It is based on JSR 223, the Java Scripting API, and makes it possible to run JavaScript from SQLcl. This adds client-side control flow, file access, better control of host commands and access to Java classes and JavaScript libraries. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

JDK 8 was the latest and greatest back in 2015 when Kris Rice promoted this feature on his blog<\/a>. The script<\/code> command worked out of the box because JDK 8 included the Nashorn JavaScript engine. Nashorn was deprecated in JDK 11 and removed in JDK 15. The current version 26.2 of SQLcl requires JDK 11 or newer, but does not include a JavaScript engine. Therefore, script<\/code> no longer works with a modern standard JDK.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The documented solution<\/a> is to use GraalVM and install its JavaScript engine using the command gu install js<\/code>. However, gu<\/code> has been removed from more recent GraalVM distributions. Applications requiring a JavaScript engine must therefore provide the necessary Maven dependencies themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Furthermore, the SQL Developer extension for VS Code comes with its own JDK 25. We cannot simply replace it with an older GraalVM JDK since some components require a JDK 25 and are therefore incompatible with older JDK versions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The script<\/code> command does not work in SQLcl embedded in SQL Developer for VS Code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s change that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Patching SQLcl in SQL Developer for VS Code<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I experimented with various approaches. The result is sqlcl-js-patch.sh<\/a>. The idea is to download the missing JavaScript engine and its dependencies from Maven Central and add them to an SQLcl installation. This shell script supports GraalJS and Nashorn on JDK 17 and newer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For SQL Developer for VS Code, I prefer Nashorn. It is compatible with the behaviour we had with JDK 8 and JDK 11 and produces no warnings when SQLcl starts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Close all SQLcl sessions in VS Code. Then run the following command in a macOS, Linux or Git Bash shell:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1) Patch SQLcl with Nashorn JavaScript engine<\/span>