Manual Authorship When one member from a set of choices  must  be chosen, the alternatives are listed within braces (“ { ”  and “ } ” ): An ellipsis ( ... ) indicates the omission of a section of a statement, typically to provide a shorter version of more complex syntax. For example,  SELECT ... INTO OUTFILE  is shorthand for the form of  SELECT statement that has an  INTO OUTFILE  clause following other parts of the statement. An ellipsis can also indicate that the preceding syntax element of a statement may be repeated. In the following example, multiple  reset_option  values may be given, with each of those after the first preceded by commas: Commands for setting shell variables are shown using Bourne shell syntax. For example, the sequence to set the  CC  environment variable and run the  configure  command looks like this in Bourne shell syntax: If you are using  csh  or  tcsh , you must issue commands somewhat differently: The Reference Manual source files are written in DocBook XML format. The HTML version and other formats are produced automatically, primarily using the DocBook XSL stylesheets. For information about DocBook, see http://docbook.org/ This manual was originally written by David Axmark and Michael “Monty”  Widenius. It is maintained by the MySQL Documentation Team, consisting of Chris Cole, Paul DuBois, Margaret Fisher, Edward Gilmore, Stefan Hinz, David Moss, Philip Olson, Daniel Price, Daniel So, and Jon Stephens. MySQL, the most popular Open Source SQL database management system, is developed, distributed, and supported by Oracle Corporation. The MySQL website (http://www.mysql.com/) provides the latest information about MySQL software. A database is a structured collection of data. It may be anything from a simple shopping list to a picture gallery or the vast amounts of information in a corporate network. To add, access, and process data stored in a computer database, you need a database management system such as MySQL Server. Since computers are very good at handling large amounts of data, database management systems play a central role in computing, as standalone utilities, or as parts of other applications.  A relational database stores data in separate tables rather than putting all the data in one big storeroom. The database structures are organized into physical files optimized for speed. The logical model, with objects such as databases, tables, views, rows, and columns, offers a flexible programming environment. You set up rules governing the relationships between different data fields, such as one-to- • MySQL databases are relational. • MySQL is a database management system. 1.2.1 What is MySQL? 1.2 Overview of the MySQL Database Management System Manual Authorship {DESCRIBE | DESC}  tbl_name  [ col_name  |  wild ] RESET  reset_option  [, reset_option ] ... shell>  CC=gcc ./configure shell>  setenv CC gcc shell>  ./configure 4