Using the Impala shell client

You obtain the commands from the Impala Virtual Warehouse owner for installing and launching the Impala shell to connect to the Impala Virtual Warehouse. You learn how to install and launch the Impala shell that connects to the Impala Virtual Warehouse UI. You then query tables in the Impala Virtual Warehouse, assuming you have authentication credentials. Windows clients are not supported.

You must have the latest stable version of Python 2.7.
You must obtain the pip installer compatible with the Python version.

In a terminal window, run the command provided by the Impala Virtual Warehouse owner to update impyla to the version compatible with the Impala Virtual Warehouse.
For example:
```
 pip install impyla==0.18a2 
```
Installing/updating to impyla 0.18a2, for example, is required before you install the Impala shell in the next step.
Run the Impala shell Download command provided by the Impala Virtual Warehouse owner to install the Impala shell.
The command looks something like this:
```
pip install impala-shell==4.1.0a1
```
The Impala shell is installed.
Run the Help command to confirm a successful installation:
```
impala-shell --help 
```
Run the provided Impala shell command to launch the Impala shell.
The command looks something like this:
```
impala-shell --protocol='hs2-http' --ssl -i 'coordinator-vw-impala.dw-dwx-rzs556.xcu2-8y8x.dev.cldr.work:443' -u client_max -l
```
The Impala shell is launched and you connect to the Impala Virtual Warehouse.
Run a SQL command to confirm that you are connected to the Impala Virtual Warehouse instance.
```
SHOW DATABASES;
```
The query returns a list of databases in the Impala Virtual Warehouse.