---
title: "Dataclips Power Insights at Heroku"
description: "Heroku Dataclips let employees create SQL queries through a web GUI against Heroku Postgres databases, then share results through unique URLs or HTTP endpoints returning CSV or JSON. At Heroku, Dataclips reduce dependence on engineers or DBAs by letting departments retrieve fresh production metrics, build dashboards, track product usage, identify deprecated-feature users, and investigate suspicious signup patterns. To make querying safer, the organization runs dataclips against a read-only Postgres follower rather than the leader; writes propagate from leader to followers in close to real-time. Business Operations also teaches SQL and the internal schema through Office Hours, aiming to replace recurring one-off requests with self-service query skills."
---

# Dataclips Power Insights at Heroku

[Heroku](https://yomu.fyi/company/heroku) · Becky Jaimes · Jul 15, 2019

**Type:** Explainer

## Summary

Heroku Dataclips let employees create SQL queries through a web GUI against Heroku Postgres databases, then share results through unique URLs or HTTP endpoints returning CSV or JSON. At Heroku, Dataclips reduce dependence on engineers or DBAs by letting departments retrieve fresh production metrics, build dashboards, track product usage, identify deprecated-feature users, and investigate suspicious signup patterns. To make querying safer, the organization runs dataclips against a read-only Postgres follower rather than the leader; writes propagate from leader to followers in close to real-time. Business Operations also teaches SQL and the internal schema through Office Hours, aiming to replace recurring one-off requests with self-service query skills.

## Context

Departments needed access to useful production data without repeatedly relying on engineers or DBAs, while querying production databases directly could allow bad SQL to lock tables and affect application performance. SQL itself was also identified as a barrier to self-service access.

## Approach / What changed

Dataclips provide a web GUI for SQL queries, shareable URLs, and CSV or JSON HTTP endpoints. Heroku runs queries against a read-only Postgres follower, restricts leader access, and teaches SQL and the internal schema through Office Hours.

## Takeaways

- A dataclip URL can be shared through email or Slack, while its JSON endpoint can feed lightweight dashboards that periodically render live data.
- Heroku used dataclips to measure Heroku Button usage, distinguish CLI deployments from button-generated deployments, and identify applications still using the Cedar-14 stack.
- Running queries on a Postgres follower protects the leader database from potentially harmful SQL while keeping replicated writes close to real time.

**Tags:** [Postgres](https://yomu.fyi/topic/postgres), [SQL](https://yomu.fyi/topic/sql)

- Source: [Heroku](https://www.heroku.com/blog/how-dataclips-power-insights-at-heroku)
- Source URL: https://www.heroku.com/blog/how-dataclips-power-insights-at-heroku
- Ingested by Yomu: 2026-09-09T14:27:41.752Z

[Read original post](https://www.heroku.com/blog/how-dataclips-power-insights-at-heroku)