SNOW-538310: Error when using create_engine() and password containing % character (#338)

Author: sfc-gh-aling

README.md

@@ -94,6 +94,46 @@ You can optionally specify the initial database and schema for the Snowflake ses
 'snowflake://<user_login_name>:<password>@<account_name>/<database_name>/<schema_name>?warehouse=<warehouse_name>&role=<role_name>'
 ```
 
+#### Escaping Special Characters such as `%, @` signs in Passwords
+
+As pointed out in [SQLAlchemy](https://docs.sqlalchemy.org/en/14/core/engines.html#escaping-special-characters-such-as-signs-in-passwords), URLs
+containing special characters need to be URL encoded to be parsed correctly. This includes the `%, @` signs. Unescaped password containing special
+characters could lead to authentication failure.
+
+The encoding for the password can be generated using `urllib.parse`:
+```python
+import urllib.parse
+urllib.parse.quote("kx@% jj5/g")
+'kx%40%25%20jj5/g'
+```
+
+**Note**: `urllib.parse.quote_plus` may also be used if there is no space in the string, as `urllib.parse.quote_plus` will replace space with `+`.
+
+To create an engine with the proper encodings, either manually constructing the url string by formatting
+or taking advantage of the `snowflake.sqlalchemy.URL` helper method:
+```python
+import urllib.parse
+from snowflake.sqlalchemy import URL
+from sqlalchemy import create_engine
+
+quoted_password = urllib.parse.quote("kx@% jj5/g")
+
+# 1. manually constructing an url string
+url = f'snowflake://testuser1:{quoted_password}@abc123/testdb/public?warehouse=testwh&role=myrole'
+engine = create_engine(url)
+
+# 2. using the snowflake.sqlalchemy.URL helper method
+engine = create_engine(URL(
+    account = 'abc123',
+    user = 'testuser1',
+    password = quoted_password,
+    database = 'testdb',
+    schema = 'public',
+    warehouse = 'testwh',
+    role='myrole',
+))
+```
+
 **Note**:
 After login, the initial database, schema, warehouse and role specified in the connection string can always be changed for the session.
 

src/snowflake/sqlalchemy/util.py

@@ -14,6 +14,11 @@ def _url(**db_parameters):
     """
     Composes a SQLAlchemy connect string from the given database connection
     parameters.
+
+    Password containing special characters (e.g., '@', '%') need to be encoded to be parsed correctly.
+    Unescaped password containing special characters might lead to authentication failure.
+    Please follow the instructions to encode the password:
+    https://github.com/snowflakedb/snowflake-sqlalchemy#escaping-special-characters-such-as---signs-in-passwords
     """
     specified_parameters = []
     if "account" not in db_parameters:

tests/test_unit_url.py

@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 #
 # Copyright (c) 2012-2022 Snowflake Computing Inc. All rights reserved.
 #
+import urllib.parse
 
 from snowflake.sqlalchemy import URL
 
@@ -25,6 +26,16 @@ def test_url():
         == "snowflake://admin:1-pass 2-pass 3-%3A 4-%40 5-%2F 6-pass@testaccount/"
     )
 
+    quoted_password = urllib.parse.quote("kx@% jj5/g")
+    assert (
+        URL(
+            account="testaccount",
+            user="admin",
+            password=quoted_password,
+        )
+        == "snowflake://admin:kx%40%25%20jj5%2Fg@testaccount/"
+    )
+
     assert (
         URL(account="testaccount", user="admin", password="test", database="testdb")
         == "snowflake://admin:test@testaccount/testdb"