3.4. phpMyAdmin: How to administer MySQL via Web

Once you have opened your phpMyAdmin (to do this, if you are working locally, you would have to open http://localhost/phpmyadmin with your browser), you will get a screen that offers you the possibilities of

• Select a database through a drop-down list.

• Create a new database

as in Figure 3-7.

Once you have chosen the desired operation, you arrive at the administration interface of your phpMyAdmin. Newer versions contain a navigation bar, located at the top (Figure 3-8), offering the following options:

• Structure: See the database structure.

• SQL: Execute SQL operations (e.g. load an existing database).

• Export: Make a backup of the database.

• Search: Search for data.

• Query: Display the structure of an SQL query (useful for programmers).

• Drop: Delete a database (be careful!).

As far as we are concerned here, we only need to explain the first 3 items: