It will be around for a long time, there's an infinite number of resources and examples for it and if you ever have to onboard someone into your code they don't need to learn something new. You can get pretty far by just using CTEs to "pipeline".
At the same time, it's challenging that SQL cannot be iteratively improved and experimented upon.
IMHO, PRQL is a reasonable approach to extending SQL without replacing SQL.
But what I'd love to see is projects like Google's zeta-sql [1] and Substrait [2] get more traction. It would provide a more stable, standardized foundation upon which SQL could be improved, which would make the case for "SQL forever" even more strong.
I've blogged about this before [3].
[1]: https://github.com/google/googlesql [2]: https://substrait.io/ [3]: https://roundup.getdbt.com/p/problem-exists-between-database...
Is there even a db vendor that offers full ANSII SQL support? Last I'd checked the answer was no.
The fact that you need to replicate the same complex expressions in multiple values that you select or multiple parts of a where clause is bad enough.
That there’s no way to pipe the result of a query into another query is just adding insult to injury. (Just create a custom view bro).
But if technology competed in quality and not in vendor lock in, we wouldn’t have to deal with C++ or JavaScript.