Installing MySQL on Windows

By Michael J. Ross
2008-02-28


Verifying MySQL

Now that you have successfully installed your new MySQL server, you should test it to verify that at least the basic operations work fine. At a command-line prompt, go to the MySQL binary directory (in our example "C:\_a\MySQL\bin"), and run the MySQL monitor program, mysql.exe:

cd \_a\MySQL\bin
mysql --password --user=root

You should be prompted for the password that you had specified during the configuration process. After you enter that, you should see a welcome banner and a command prompt, "mysql>".

Welcome to the MySQL monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 4
Server version:  5.0.51a-community-nt MySQL Community Edition (GPL)
Type 'help;' or '\h' for help.  Type '\c' to clear the buffer.
mysql>

You could then go into the MySQL database and list the tables. In fact, exploring the structure of these tables can give you insight into how MySQL works.

mysql> use mysql;
Database changed
mysql> show tables;
+---------------------------+
| Tables_in_mysql           |
+---------------------------+
| columns_priv              |
| db                        |
| func                      |
| help_category             |
| help_keyword              |
| help_relation             |
| help_topic                |
| host                      |
| proc                      |
| procs_priv                |
| tables_priv               |
| time_zone                 |
| time_zone_leap_second     |
| time_zone_name            |
| time_zone_transition      |
| time_zone_transition_type |
| user                      |
+---------------------------+
17 rows in set (0.00 sec)
mysql> quit
Bye

At this point, you have successfully installed and configured your MySQL database server, and can begin creating databases and everything that can be stored in them.

Tutorial Pages:
» Introduction
» MySQL Already Installed?
» Downloading MySQL
» Installing MySQL
» Configuring MySQL
» Verifying MySQL
» More Resources

Related Tutorials: » Implementing High Availability in MySQL » Stored Procedures are EVIL » MySQL Database Handling in PHP » A Flexible Method of Storing Control Data » Exploring MySQL CURDATE and NOW. The Same But Different. » Creating a PostgreSQL and MySQL driver