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Quickstart

1. Initialize a config file

copia init

This creates a .copia.toml template in the current directory.

.copia.toml
[profiles.default]
adapter = "mysql"
host = "localhost"
port = 3306
database = "mydb"
user = "root"
# password = ""

Edit it to match your database. You can define multiple profiles — one per environment or database.

Copia looks for config in two places:

  • Local — .copia.toml in the current directory
  • Global — {system config directory}/copia/profiles.toml (see below)

$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/copia/profiles.toml (usually ~/.config/copia/profiles.toml)

~/Library/Application Support/copia/profiles.toml

%APPDATA%\copia\profiles.toml

2. Launch Copia

copia tui

This uses the default profile from your config. To use a different profile:

copia tui staging

To force local or global config lookup:

copia tui --local    # only reads .copia.toml
copia tui --global   # only reads the global config

3. Pick a table

The left panel shows all tables in your database. Select the one you want to seed.

4. Write your seed

In the editor, describe each column using the Copia DSL — one line per column.

id:         uuid()
username:   username()
email:      email(safe=True)
password:   password(length=16)
created_at: past_date()

Press ? at any time to open the help screen — full DSL reference and all available generators.

5. Run and insert

  • Click Run to generate a preview of the rows.
  • Review the results in the table below the editor.
  • Click Submit to insert the rows into the database.

Next steps