MySQL Cookbook Book Review

Solutions and Examples for Database Developers and DBAs

MySQL Cookbook is the 2nd edition of the book and it covers MySQL version 5, it also includes Ruby examples.

MySQL Cookbook is a massive book at over 900 pages, and has to be viewed as a reference book, it could be read cover to cover but it’s really heavy to hold.

MySQL Cookbook manages to cover all the major areas and topics of MySQL that you would ever need to know about. The good thing is that the book gives real world examples to problems that you may want to solve in everyday work.

There are 20 chapters in MySQL Cookbook and the first chapter covers using the mysql client program, instead of a GUI MySQL admin program. Mysql client program allows you to start and stop the database, submit sql statements, create scrips and much more.

There are then chapters on selecting data from tables and table management such as cloning tables, creating temporary tables, changing a table’s storage engine.

The following chapters cover working with strings and date and time in SQL statements such as pattern matching, using fulltext searches and using timestamps and how to set the client time zone.

There is then information on sorting query results, how to generate data summaries, obtaining and using meta data from mysql, importing and exporting data and generating and using sequences.

Further chapters cover using multiple tables in queries, working on statistical techniques, how to handle duplicates and perform transactions.

MySQL Cookbook also includes a couple of really good chapters on programming stored routines, trigger and events – such as using triggers to log table changes or using a procedure to return multiple values and also a chapter on using MySQL based web session management in Perl, Ruby, PHP and Tomcat based applcations.

It’s difficult to talk in too much detail about everything in MySQL cookbook, as the book is so large and covers such a wide range of topics.

Overall MySQL cookbook is an excellent reference book which anyone working with MySQL should own. There must be something in this book for everyone, I’m sure everyone will learn something new.