NewsForge: Backing Up Your MySQL Data

“If you have ever pulled your hair out in frustration over data
loss, no doubt the word ‘backup’ has special meaning in your life.
Databases offer a nice way to catalog data, but with the amount of
data being trusted into MySQL databases these days, the
after-effects of an unwise DROP DATABASE command, an
unlucky system crash, or a failed hand-edit of the table structure
are catastrophic and can be unrecoverable–unless you have a backup
to restore from.

“MySQL has a built-in command line utility called
mysqldump that works with the MySQL server to create
platform-independent text files full of the database’s
content…”

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