A .qfpipe file is what a Data Sync becomes when you save it as a file instead of, or in addition to, a job inside QueryFlow.
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Quick answer: A .qfpipe file holds a saved pipeline definition, the source and target you picked, the field mapping between them, and the write mode. It's how a Data Sync is stored, shared between people, or brought over to a different Mac running QueryFlow. We're not going to publish an exact internal file-format spec here; treat it as an exportable, importable pipeline definition rather than something meant to be hand-edited outside the app.
Most sync tools store a pipeline's configuration somewhere internal and don't give you a portable file for it. QueryFlow's Data Sync jobs can be saved as a .qfpipe file, a single file that represents the pipeline: which source and target it connects, how the fields map between them, and which write mode (Insert, Update, or Upsert) it uses. Think of it the way you'd think of a saved query file, except it captures an entire mapped sync rather than a single SQL statement.
The practical use case is straightforward: a pipeline built on one Mac can be shared as a .qfpipe file and imported on another Mac running QueryFlow, without re-dragging every field mapping by hand. It's a convenience for moving a sync's definition around, not a general data-interchange format meant for other tools to read.
Inside Pipelines → Build, a sync you've built, source, target, field mapping, and mode, can be exported to a .qfpipe file and imported back in on another install. The connections it references (the actual credentials for the source and target) aren't bundled into the file; those stay in the macOS Keychain on whichever machine has them configured, so importing a .qfpipe file still requires the matching connections to already exist, or be added, on the machine you're importing it into.
We won't speculate about the file's internal structure beyond that. If you need to know the exact schema for some integration reason, that's a question for QueryFlow's own documentation or support rather than something to guess at here.
It's worth being clear about what a .qfpipe file is not: it doesn't contain any of the actual rows a sync moves. It's a definition of a process, source, target, mapping, mode, not a snapshot of data. Two people importing the same .qfpipe file on two different Macs, each with their own connections to the same kind of source and target, would run the same pipeline shape against their own live data, not share any rows between them.
Say a consultant builds a BigQuery-to-Databricks upsert pipeline for a client, mapped carefully and tested with Dry Run. Exporting it as a .qfpipe file and handing it to the client's own analyst, who has QueryFlow and the same two connections configured under their own account, saves that analyst from re-dragging every field mapping by hand. They import the file, confirm the connections resolve to their own, and the pipeline is ready to run or schedule on their machine.
Even without another person involved, exporting a carefully built sync to a .qfpipe file is a reasonable way to keep a copy outside the app itself, the same instinct that leads people to keep a saved copy of an important SQL query in a text file. It's not a substitute for QueryFlow's own storage of the pipeline, just a second copy that doesn't depend on nothing going wrong with the app or the machine it's on.
Importing a .qfpipe file rebuilds the pipeline's structure, source and target tables, the field mapping, and the write mode, inside your own QueryFlow. If the connections it references don't already exist on your machine under the same names, expect to be prompted to point the pipeline at your own equivalent connections before it's ready to run.
Build the pipeline this file represents with the Data Sync tutorial, or see field mapping for how the mapping step inside it actually works.
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