Learning MySQL: Get a Handle on Your Data

I have been working with MySQL for about 6 years but never took the time to do any formal learning so I was looking for a book to "fill in the gaps". After seeing the Amazon.com ratings for this O'Reilly book I decided to try Learning MySQL.This book was written about the time I started using MySQL and I'm very glad that I didn't read this book then. The book is extremely disorganized and never decides on a target audience. It lacks consistency and relies heavily on a website that is no longer available for supplemental materials. The book does contain some useful information but that information is far overshadowed by its negative features. It's hardly a book of learning and would be better described as a book of bad examples. That's on top of the frequent grammatical mistakes and incoherent explanations.Chapter 2:This chapter tries to cover every possible condition in installing the components of the LAMP stack used by the book. Not only was the information in Chapter 2 already outdated when the book was published but at 85 pages it's the worst chapter I've read in any book in a very long time. Coverage for Linux and Mac were poor and the book would be much better off if Chapter 2 was simply omitted. Unfortunately chapter 2 is referenced literally from every subsequent chapter.Bloated:The book is riddled with screenshots and example output received by the console. This alone adds probably 100 pages to the book. Not to mention the authors' tangents into the irrelevant and then adding references on top of those irrelevant topics. At least 10% of the rest of the book is text copied and pasted from elsewhere in the book and it seemed like the authors were just trying to make it longer like a term paper that's required to be a certain number of pages yet you can't think of anything more to write.Bad Habits:The authors do make some valid points in the areas of security and designing schemata but then do all of the examples without adhering to any of those points. For instance, it's explained how important keeping the root password secure is and then nearly every example in the book instructs you to use the root password on the command line or to type it as plain text into source code or data files. So much of the book is passed on as fact or best practice when it's actually the opinion of the authors and it's very unfortunate that more often than not that opinion disagrees with actual conventions and standards.Code:The code is careless and not very well thought through or proofread. When the authors include code examples for something and can't think of an application for what they are describing they just say "you'll probably never have to do this" or "should never do". The explanation for at least one SQL code example is just flat out wrong though the small dataset doesn't make the difference apparent. Elsewhere the code examples even contain syntactical mistakes and were obviously never run through a parser themselves. One PHP example instantiates a variable $count and refers to that variable 3 lines of code later as $len.Appendix:The example PHP/MySQL application in the Appendix in the back of the book is so inconsistent code-wise that it looks like it was written by several people.A beginner trying to learn MySQL from this book is going to learn more bad practices and bad habits than MySQL. The examples in the book are only good enough for examples and in many cases cannot or should not be applied to real world scenarios and applications.

This book is divided into two principal parts. The first covers installing MySQL, some principles of database schema design, and the syntax of all the SQL statements that most users are likely to encounter (or need). If you follow the examples in the book, you will also become well-acquainted with the MySQL CLI. This is an indispenable skill if you will be managing a production server or debugging an application problem (and need to peek at the data through the eyes of an unbiased, third party).The second part shifts gears and discusses writing web applications in PHP and Perl that interface with MySQL databases. If I could choose, I would trade this part for more discussion on database performance analysis and optimization. The subject is approached in the first part, but not in any depth. I have purchased a copy of _High Performance MySQL_ (2nd Edition; O'Reilly) and after a brief skim, that book may be the one to address those issues.

I like the book

I have 31 years experience as a code developer for large corporations with some database work but limited HTML and no MySQL or PHP. I was up and running with command line MySQL very quickly, then assumed that the book's PHP wouldn't be enough, so bought 4 PHP specific books - those books started collecting dust as I continually returned to the wedding registry example in Learning MySQL for understanding. I agree that the index could be more extensive since this book becomes a primary reference. I was able to read cover-to-cover in several days, which is amazing in a tech book. I would use this book to teach general database as well MySQL, although some may be more comfortable with more of an entry level book.

I did learn a lot from this book although it is not up to date with the current version of MySQL so I had to go online to get the most current documentation. The book does cover a number of topics necessary to run MySQL and the explanations are good. I would recommend this book.

This series of books has a rightful reputation for clarity of exposition. The author does not merely start with "how you write code for this database" but starts out much earlier: how to get the app up and running in your own computer.There are other books for those who want to start with intermediate-level constructions and go to advanced. This one suits my purposes as a newbie with a goal in mind but needing a map to get there.

This is a great book. I bought it many years ago, and I picked it up recently and found it to be the best book available for me to find a topic that I could not find well-reviewed online.. I am a moderate to advanced in my skills with MySQL, and I find the presentation to be excellent for most issues because there are working examples provided that the user can repeat, if so inclined. I wish the authors would come up with an upgraded version of the book (albeit the basics haven't changed), especially to address the use of MySQL with scripting languages.

The book is terrific. It starts from the basics, establishes a foundation, then begins to build up from there. It is well written with lots of examples that show the input and the expected output.A separate word of thanks to the publisher. Unlike so many other publishers that make books available for Kindle, this publisher included "Page Numbers" on the pages. Lessor publishers just have the "Location" number which has no practical purpose.Having pages numbers makes it possible to assist people that are using the physical books.

I was hoping for a good introduction to MySQL. However, when it talks about Windows XP being the latest version of Windows, about command line installations, and you realise that it is over 10 years old, then there is nothing here which can help me in today’s world.

Husband loved it.

J'ai acheté ce livre car pour des besoins professionnels je souhaite apprendre le langage SQL. J'ai trouvé cette ouvre qui permet d'avoir à disposition sur son PC un environnement de test complet, les exemples sont très faciles à comprendre et l'explication des concepts dans le livre est très claire et complète.

This book was horrible for my class. Would not recommend. Was so hard to follow and boring.

Decent book, a bit hard to follow in parts.