MySQL Cookbook

by Paul DuBois

Along with MySQL's popularity has come a flood of questions about solving specific problems, and that's where this Cookbook is essential. Designed as a handy resource when you need quick solutions or techniques, the book offers dozens of short, focused pieces of code and hundreds of worked-out examples for programmers of all levels who don't have the time (or expertise) to solve MySQL problems from scratch. The new edition covers MySQL 5.0 and its powerful new features, as well as the older but still widespread MySQL 4.1. One major emphasis of this book is how to use SQL to formulate queries for particular kinds of questions, using the mysql client program included in MySQL distributions. The other major emphasis is how to write programs that interact with the MySQL server through an API. You'll find plenty of examples using several language APIs in multiple scenarios and situations, including the use of Ruby to retrieve and format data. There are also many new examples for using Perl, PHP, Python, and Java as well. Other recipes in the book teach you to:

MySQL Cookbook doesn't attempt to develop full-fledged, complex applications. Instead, it's intended to assist you in developing applications yourself by helping you get past problems that have you stumped.

Genres: Programming, Reference, Nonfiction, Technology, Technical, Website Design, Computer Science

980 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2002

About the author

Paul DuBois is the author of MySQL (Addison-Wesley Professional); MySQL Cookbook, Using csh & tcsh, and Software Portability with imake (O'Reilly); and MySQL and Perl for the Web (New Riders).

Reviews

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

I rarely read programming books, and even more infrequently have anything nice to say about them. But I found this book to be a great list of recipes, suggestions, and insider's tips for writing good SQL (Standard Query Language -- the language you use to talk to relational databases).

Paul Dubois is a notable expert in the field anyway. If I recall correctly, he's the documentation lead for the MySQL project. Thus, he's certainly well qualified to write something like this.

The tips (or most of them, at least) are highly readable, often practical, and are accompanied with illuminating text (not to be confused with ILLUMINATED text, which would certainly be a first in the programming world).

One thing was noticeably absent, though: tips on tuning queries. Dear Paul Dubois: If you ever read this, please add a section on tuning queries, using EXPLAIN, and improving overall DB performance.

[Chris Patterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my goto book for SQL scripts. If there is an issue I'm having with something deep I can merge the concepts and scripts in this book to get the result I'm looking for.

[Michael Milawski · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book for mysql. It contains not only many sql queries but also solutions for problems that are not really solvable by sql queries alone, it shows code examples for that matter. It also shows ways of how to configure the server correctly. Very useful book.

[Leonardo]

Recomendado en Web Scraping with Python.

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good reference book containing pre-canned routines for accessing and manipulating a MySQL database. It is a good starting point for making routines to generate reports or validate data.

One other book on my list: MySQL Stored Procedure Programming is a good companion read to this one, as it shows the particulars of how to write logic on the server side. The code in the Cookbook can be used on the server side with ease. The other book also has more advice on how to optimize MySQL code when it does not have satisfactory performance.

[Adrian · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little bland... ba-dump-bump-bing. It had some interesting ideas for monitoring server status programatically, views for summary tables, and gathering stats/logs with triggers. When I do more of those things in detail, I may glance at certain parts again. Available online at Safari Books. [Skimmed w/some reading]

[Vaughn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ha ha, just kidding. But seriously, I am reading this, slowly, for cause, which is the only reason why anyone would...

Update: It did the trick. Quick access to many little tricks that would have taken too much time to think up myself. Sweet. Recommended!

[Yuan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love the structure! It provides you options to go through all the MySql “recipes” quickly and dive into details!
Used the book for repairing technical test interview. Will go through the details to enhance understanding for sure.

[kunKUN herHER · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sekarang in progress apply it to my world... heheh

[Ibnu Triyono · Rating 4 out of 5]

wonderful book, Always looking here if i ever get problem with Mysql