Code a Day

Every time I connect to a mysql server, I see the “Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the buffer.” notice but just ignore it. This morning I decided to ‘\h’ just to see what the in-line help was and found a score of useful commands I had never known about before, possibly the most useful one being ‘\P’.

pager (\P) Set PAGER [to_pager]. Print the query results via PAGER.

if I had a nickel for every minute I spent changing the scrollback of my terminal and then scrolling back for pages and pages to investigate query results I’d be a thousandaire. A simple ‘\P less;‘ now makes my life a little easier. Of course, if you don’t think less is more, you can ‘\P more;‘ instead.

For the curious, here’s the totality of the ‘\h’ output:

List of all MySQL commands:
Note that all text commands must be first on line and end with ‘;’
? (\?) Synonym for `help’.
clear (\c) Clear command.
connect (\r) Reconnect to the server. Optional arguments are db and host.
delimiter (\d) Set statement delimiter. NOTE: Takes the rest of the line as new delimiter.
edit (\e) Edit command with $EDITOR.
ego (\G) Send command to mysql server, display result vertically.
exit (\q) Exit mysql. Same as quit.
go (\g) Send command to mysql server.
help (\h) Display this help.
nopager (\n) Disable pager, print to stdout.
notee (\t) Don’t write into outfile.
pager (\P) Set PAGER [to_pager]. Print the query results via PAGER.
print (\p) Print current command.
prompt (\R) Change your mysql prompt.
quit (\q) Quit mysql.
rehash (\#) Rebuild completion hash.
source (\.) Execute an SQL script file. Takes a file name as an argument.
status (\s) Get status information from the server.
system (\!) Execute a system shell command.
tee (\T) Set outfile [to_outfile]. Append everything into given outfile.
use (\u) Use another database. Takes database name as argument.
charset (\C) Switch to another charset. Might be needed for processing binlog with multi-byte charsets.
warnings (\W) Show warnings after every statement.
nowarning (\w) Don’t show warnings after every statement.

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