Privileges Provided by MySQL 1186 •If the user name and password contain only ASCII characters, it is possible to connect to the server regardless of character set settings. To enable connections when the user name or password contain non-ASCII characters, client applications should call the  mysql_options() C API function with the MYSQL_SET_CHARSET_NAME  option and appropriate character set name as arguments. This causes authentication to take place using the specified character set. Otherwise, authentication fails unless the server default character set is the same as the encoding in the authentication defaults. •Passwords stored in the  user  table are encrypted using plugin-specific algorithms. •Administrative privileges enable users to manage operation of the MySQL server. These privileges are global because they are not specific to a particular database. •Database privileges apply to a database and to all objects within it. These privileges can be granted for specific databases, or globally so that they apply to all databases. The privileges granted to a MySQL account determine which operations the account can perform. MySQL privileges differ in the contexts in which they apply and at different levels of operation: For additional information about specifying user names, passwords, and other connection parameters, see Section 4.2.4, “Connecting to the MySQL Server Using Command Options” . 6.2.2 Privileges Provided by MySQL Specifying a password on the command line should be considered insecure. See Section 6.1.2.1, “End- User Guidelines for Password Security” . To avoid giving the password on the command line, use an option file or a login path file. See Section 4.2.2.2, “Using Option Files” , and Section 4.6.7, “mysql_config_editor — MySQL Configuration Utility” . If you omit the password value following the  --password  or  -p  option on the command line (as just shown), the client prompts for one. Alternatively, the password can be specified on the command line: shell>  mysql -u finley -p  db_name If you prefer short options, the command looks like this: shell>  mysql --user=finley --password  db_name If you use the  -p  option, there must be  no space  between  -p  and the following password value. shell>  mysql --user=finley --password= password db_name shell>  mysql -u finley -p password db_name To connect to a MySQL server with a command-line client, specify user name and password options as necessary for the account that you want to use: The MySQL installation process populates the grant tables with an initial  root  account, as described in Section 2.10.4, “Securing the Initial MySQL Account” , which also discusses how to assign a password to it. Thereafter, you normally set up, modify, and remove MySQL accounts using statements such as  CREATE USER ,  DROP USER ,  GRANT , and  REVOKE . See Section 6.2.8, “Adding Accounts, Assigning Privileges, and Dropping Accounts” , and Section 13.7.1, “Account Management Statements” . Standard MySQL client programs support a  --default-character-set  option that causes mysql_options()  to be called as just described. In addition, character set autodetection is supported as described in Section 10.4, “Connection Character Sets and Collations” . For programs that use a connector that is not based on the C API, the connector may provide an equivalent to mysql_options()  that can be used instead. Check the connector documentation. The preceding notes do not apply for  ucs2 ,  utf16 , and  utf32 , which are not permitted as client character sets.