MySQL Cookbook

Selecting a Database

Problem

You want to tell mysql which database to use.

Solution

Name the database on the mysql command line or issue a USE statement from within mysql.

Discussion

When you issue a query that refers to a table (as most queries do), you need to indicate which database the table is part of. One way to do so is to use a fully qualified table reference that begins with the database name. (For example, cookbook.limbs refers to the limbs table in the cookbook database.) As a convenience, MySQL also allows you to select a default (current) database so that you can refer to its tables without explicitly specifying the database name each time. You can specify the database on the command line when you start mysql:

% mysql cookbook

If you provide options on the command line such as connection parameters when you run mysql, they should precede the database name:

% mysql -h host -p -u user cookbook

If you’ve already started a mysql session, you can select a database (or switch to a different one) by issuing a USE statement:

mysql> USE cookbook;
Database changed

If you’ve forgotten or are not sure which database is the current one (which can happen easily if you’re using multiple databases and switching between them several times during the course of a mysql session), use the following statement:

mysql> SELECT DATABASE( );
+------------+
| DATABASE( ) |
+------------+
| cookbook   |
+------------+

DATABASE( ) is a function that returns the name of the current database. If no database ...