We tolerate the SQL as it is, warts and all, because as soon as you bikeshed it it will explode into 50 different dialects. Just look at JSON for example.
But none of that is the problem. I'm not a data analyst. I don't need a query Swiss army knife. I need a database that behaves predictably under concurrency at a level I can understand. I need primitive operations that map well to the persistence needs of an app serving multiple users at scale. I've never said SQL is incapable or even inadequate at these tasks but figuring out how to do them correctly ends up being a test of English skills rather than picking the right function to call and the right arguments to pass it.
> An opcode with some arguments would be preferable to writing a poem and hoping it gets interpreted how I meant
Not sure I follow here though? Is it the declarative nature you don’t like? SQL can be a bit ugly sometimes, but I’ve never really had “no that’s not what I mean” moments?
https://www.sqlite.org/lang_createtable.html
You will find all the same information in the Postgres docs, but in a more obtuse, grammatical form.
https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/sql-createtable.html
They will tell you what each component does further down the page though.
Mongo's documentation has a slicker and more ergonomic design though, no question. Mongo uses a "cheat sheet"/"tabular" approach, and Postgres uses a "printed reference book" approach, which is rather dated. Mongo is very good at surfacing the complexity and nitty gritty details immediately. It's all there in the Postgres docs, but you have to sit with them for longer and have more of an intuition about how they've organized it.
I've also found the Postgres.FM podcast to be a great resource. I've been working with Mongo recently and something that's bothered me is that I haven't found a comparable resource, where practitioners give you the straight dope about what stupid mistake you're going to make to bring down production and how to fix it. Substantially all of the learning material for Mongo is from Mongo the company, and is just not as candid.