How to create and delete databases and tables in MySQL

This page is a memo of how to do some tasks with the MySQL database engine.

Create a new database

To create a new database,

mysql> CREATE DATABASE name;

where name is the name of the new database.

Select which database to use

To choose a database,

mysql> USE name;

where name is the name of the database you wish to use.

Find out what databases exist

To get a list of all the databases,

mysql> SHOW DATABASES;

Find out what tables the current database has

To get a list of tables in the current database, use

mysql> SHOW TABLES;

Create a table

To make a new table in the current database which can contain a list of numbers,

mysql> CREATE TABLE name (numbers INTEGER);

Here name is the name of the table, and numbers is the name of the column which contains the numbers. To make a new table which can contain a list of numbers and words,

mysql> CREATE TABLE name (numbers INTEGER, words TEXT);

Delete a table from a database

To remove a table from a database,

mysql> DROP TABLE name;

where name is the name of the table you wish to remove.

Delete a database

To delete a database,

mysql> DROP DATABASE name;

where name is the name of the database you wish to remove.