MySQL Crash Course

Maybe it's the nature of SQL, but this is the perfect format for SQL if you already have some experience with what a relational database is. I took a half-semester course in microsoft access, which is a pointy-clicky kind of microsoft office product suitable for small businesses. I decided to delve into the specifics and this was good and to-the-points. It's 5 to 10 minutes of reading per chapter (sometimes less!) and it's: here are these commands, this is what they do, don't make these mistakes. It didn't feel like much of a chore to learn this. However, four stars because I had a lot of trouble setting up MySQL and the book was a terrible resource for figuring out how it worked and how to use it. So that was a pretty sore spot. Otherwise, I'll be keeping this around since it's written in a way that is... very 'atomic,' it will also make a great reference source in the future (while still not reading like ikea instructions).

I have been using MySQL for years and it's easy to get by with the basic SELECT, DELETE, UPDATE statements. Recently I discovered the powers of JOIN statements and realized how much more was possible. I have only read a few chapters of this but I'm already impressed. It's just what I wanted because it gives you the syntax and gritty details of each feature without getting tedious and turning into a 1000 page reference manual.I can already tell I'm going to be poking around this book for years to come. I think this does a great job of filling in the gaps for someone who can already write a basic SELECT, UPDATE, INSERT statement but is looking for more. Seems good from a new user perspective too but if you haven't at least looked at some online tutorials and tested some basic statements for yourself then I would recommend doing that and then reading this book immediately afterward.

If you are considering MySQL you may not know how, but you are not a dummy. This book is not for dummys in that it doesn't patronize nor take you into convoluted scenarios, this book is for the reasonably intelligent who want to do stuff. What a blessing.I was familiar with databases having worked with MS Access, but I had never worked with SQL. This book hit the spot in showing me what I needed to know to get going. I am now using MySQL successfully with a Java/Struts front end. While I found a few small gaps in this book, it has helped tremendously in my learning journey in that it gets to the point with minimum emotional overhead and verbosity, unlike  MySQL (4th Edition) (Developer's Library)  which I have found to be pretty useless and weighty after reading Forta's book.This book has clear, short, well labeled chapters to find what you need. Highly recommended.

It's important to understand exactly what this book is and is not. It IS a broad introduction to the SQL dialect as available in MySQL. It performs its job satisfactorily.However, you are almost completely on your own when it comes to anything to do with setting up, configuring and problem-solving. For example, when it comes to setting up the example tables, the instructions are extremely sketchy: unless you know that, under Windows, you have to escape '\' as '\\', you will run into problems running the SQL scripts. Similarly, how to start and login to MySQL from the command line using any other account than root is not discussed. These are basic details where any true novice is going to need some handholding. Confusingly, the author refers to 'datasource' which, it seems (it's not explained) is a synonym for 'database'. Thanks to these sorts of lacunae, it was difficult to 'hit the ground running' (author's claim) and you may have to do some googling around before you can get down to business.

As others have said, this is a great book for beginners, whether in MySQL or in databases in general. Because I have a lot of database experience, I went throught it very quickly.When I started to apply some of the techniques I learned to existing applications, I found out VERY quickly that this is insufficient as a reference. Each topic has enough hands-on examples to give you a start, but not nearly enough depth to use for looking things up.I thought that Appendix B on creating the sample tables might have been a little abbreviated for the novice user. It refers to Chapter 2 to create a new datasource, but I think it was a little confusing jumping back and forth between the appendix and the chapter. This might be better as an exercise right in the chapter.Overall, I would recommend this book as a starting point.

I purchased this book to quickly teach myself MySQL server and it's flavor of SQL (Structured Query Language). It was my best purchase in a long time. Not only did I learn enough to get a A+ on a university project that required database usage when I always depended on a DBA at work, but I am now able to write my own stored procs, functions, and build databases for my own projects. Even if if using another SQL-based database than MySQL. The practices and knowledge will go much further than with MySQL. Thanks for this book I am now better at MS SQL Server (and T-SQL), PostgreSQL projects, and even helped me improve my LINQ queries in C# using the background I've learned from this book. Thanks Ben Forta!

I purchased this book because of the high reviews that it received from others and it has certainly lived up to those reviews. Ben Forta has a way of cutting through the details by giving concise explanations of each database statement and by providing output examples of each statement. His prose is not so terse as to leave the reader in the dark but just verbose enough to promote an understanding of the MySQL language syntax. This is an excellent book to have next to your computer whenever you need to confirm your syntax or if you need to figure out how to perform a query that may be complex. Even the size of the book is a plus (5.5 x 8 in.), as it's quite easy to thumb through and locate whatever it is you need. Just another great book from Sams Publishing.

This book is not a course. It reads more like a reference book.Frustratingly, all of the examples in the book are based on a database called crashcourse. I wondered where to get this database. I tried the author's website and eventually found 2 sql scripts. Even the appendix that mentions this, gives no instruction as to what to do with them. I had to figure it out by going to the tutorial on the MySql website! That left me thinking, why I have I forked out for a course book, if the only way to use the book is follow free tutorials on the web?This is very poor indeed. Not recommended for beginners. It is obvious that the author didn't properly test this 'course' on any newbie.

This book was perfect for me.I'm a programmer faced with using SQL for the 1st time (mySQL in particular). Usually I find tutorials over-long & mostly irrelevant to me. This one told me just what I needed to know.2 days ago I didn't know where to start - the mySQL documentation isn't written for newbies. Now I know enough to make design decisions, and am happy experimenting with the database. Result!

excellent quality and quick delivery thank you

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