MySQL Reference Manual

Chapter 8. MySQL APIs

This chapter describes the APIs available for MySQL, where to get them, and how to use them. The C API is the most extensively covered, as it was developed by the MySQL team and is the basis for most of the other APIs.

MySQL PHP API

PHP is a server-side, HTML-embedded scripting language that may be used to create dynamic web pages. It contains support for accessing several databases, including MySQL. PHP may be run as a separate program or compiled as a module for use with the Apache web server.

The distribution and documentation are available at the PHP web site (http://www.php.net/).

Common Problems with MySQL and PHP

• Error: “Maximum Execution Time Exceeded.” This is a PHP limit. Go into the php3.ini file and set the maximum execution time up from 30 seconds to something higher, as needed. It is also not a bad idea to double the RAM allowed per script to 16M instead of 8M.

• Error: “Fatal error: Call to unsupported or undefined function mysql_connect( ) in ..” This means that your PHP version isn’t compiled with MySQL support. You can either compile a dynamic MySQL module and load it into PHP or recompile PHP with built-in MySQL support. This is described in detail in the PHP manual.

• Error: “undefined reference to `uncompress’.” This means that the client library is compiled with support for a compressed client/server protocol. The fix is to add -lz last when linking with -lmysqlclient.