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The moment it happens

Ask your data questions in plain English

You send a question and get the answer from your tables by email, without writing SQL.

Runs
The moment it happens
Apps
BigQuery
AI
Yes, uses the built-in AI allowance
Access
read (Job User + Data Viewer)

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: give me a link I can send questions to; have AI write SQL for my sales dataset, run it read-only with a 1 GB scan cap and email me the answer with the query it used.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

A marketing lead or founder keeps a question in their head all week: which campaign sources brought paying customers in March, how many signups came from Germany, what was average order value last quarter. The data sits in BigQuery, but the only person who writes SQL is a busy analyst, so the question waits in a queue, or gets answered from a stale dashboard that does not quite slice the data the way they need.

You send a question in plain English to a webhook. ClickRuntime reads the schemas of your BigQuery tables, uses its built-in AI to write a SQL query from your question, runs that query in read-only mode and emails you the result. It runs the moment your message arrives, and no OpenAI or Anthropic key is needed because the AI step is included.

It is especially handy for teams with one analyst and many curious people, where most questions are simple counts, sums and group-bys.

What you get out of it

  • Questions answered without an analyst queue

    A product manager asking for weekly active users by plan gets a table in their inbox minutes later. The analyst keeps their afternoon for modeling work instead of fielding one-off counts.

  • Decisions made while the question is fresh

    When a pricing debate is happening in a meeting, an answer that arrives the same hour can change the outcome. Waiting three days for a query means the decision is usually already made on a guess.

  • Read-only access protects your warehouse

    The generated query runs read-only, so a badly phrased question cannot modify or delete a table. That makes it reasonable to let non-technical colleagues ask questions of production-adjacent data. Your warehouse stays protected even when many different people send questions.

  • Results land in a place people already read

    The answer is emailed rather than buried in another tool. Forwarding it to a stakeholder or pasting it into a doc needs no export step, and the email also serves as a record of what was asked.

  • Less dashboard sprawl

    Many one-off dashboards exist only because someone had one specific question. Asking directly avoids building and maintaining a chart that will be opened twice and then forgotten. Fewer abandoned charts also means fewer stale numbers circulating in old links.

How it works

What happens, step by step

  1. When you send a question, such as "Which 3 customers ordered most last month?", ClickRuntime picks it up straight away.

  2. It reads the layout of your BigQuery tables, and AI writes a query that answers your question.

  3. ClickRuntime runs the query in read-only mode, so nothing in your data can change.

  4. You get an email with the answer as a small table, with the query underneath so you can check it.

Before it runs live

  • Connect BigQuery
  • Paste your automation's link into the other app's webhook settings

What you get

RunsThe moment it happens
Ask your data questions in plain Englishjust nowSucceeded
Email · Answer: Which 3 customers ordered most last month?customer | total Northwind Traders | 18420.00 Acme Corp | 12960.50

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.
  • Your own rules

    Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.

  • Any number of apps

    One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.

  • AI where it helps

    Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.

  • On a schedule or on each event

    Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

  • Act only on the items that match your own rules, and skip the rest
  • Change what the AI looks for, or how it writes the result
  • Add another app, for example also send it to Slack
  • Combine it with other BigQuery steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.
ask_questions_in_plain_english.pyexample
from clickruntime import on_event, credentials, http, ai, notify

PROJECT, DATASET = "my-project", "sales"
TABLES = ["orders", "customers"]

@on_event
def handle(event):
    question = event.json["question"]
    h = {"Authorization": f"Bearer {credentials.connection('google', 'work')}"}
    base = f"https://bigquery.googleapis.com/bigquery/v2/projects/{PROJECT}"
    schemas = []
    for t in TABLES:
        fields = http.get(f"{base}/datasets/{DATASET}/tables/{t}", headers=h).json()["schema"]["fields"]
        schemas.append(f"{DATASET}.{t}(" + ", ".join(f"{f['name']} {f['type']}" for f in fields) + ")")
    sql = ai.generate(f"Tables:\n{chr(10).join(schemas)}\n\nQuestion: {question}",
                      system="Write one BigQuery standard SQL SELECT that answers the question. Reply with SQL only, LIMIT 50.",
                      max_output_tokens=300).text.strip().strip("`").removeprefix("sql").strip()
    if not sql.lower().startswith(("select", "with")):
        raise ValueError("Only SELECT queries are run")
    res = http.post(f"{base}/queries", headers=h, json={"query": sql, "useLegacySql": False, "maxResults": 50}).json()
    cols = [f["name"] for f in res["schema"]["fields"]]
    rows = [" | ".join(str(c["v"]) for c in r["f"]) for r in res.get("rows", [])]
    notify.email_me(f"Answer: {question[:80]}", f"{' | '.join(cols)}\n" + "\n".join(rows) + f"\n\nSQL:\n{sql}")
    return {"rows": len(rows)}

FAQ

Common questions

Can the generated SQL change or delete my BigQuery data?
The query step is read-only, so it can select data but not write, update or drop tables. The schemas are read first so the AI refers to real table and column names. You can still check the run record to see exactly which query was produced.
How accurate is the SQL the AI writes?
It works from your actual table schemas, which helps it pick correct columns, but ambiguous questions can produce a query that answers something slightly different from what you meant. Asking specific questions, such as naming the date range and table, gives more reliable results.
Which BigQuery permissions does it need?
The connected Google credential needs to be able to read table metadata and run query jobs on the datasets you want to ask about. Limiting it to specific datasets keeps unrelated tables out of reach. Credentials are stored as secrets, not in the workflow.
What permissions does it need?
read (Job User + Data Viewer). Nothing else in your accounts is used.
Does it need AI?
Yes. It uses ClickRuntime's built-in AI, so you don't need an OpenAI or Anthropic key. Every plan includes a monthly AI allowance.
How many runs does it use?
One run for each event the app sends.
Can I change how it works?
Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Set up “Ask your data questions in plain English” from your assistant

Copy the prompt above, or connect your assistant first. Free plan, no credit card.