Tech Goes Boom

Review: MySql Administrator for Mac

The fine folks over at mysql.com have finally released their MySQL Administrator Package for Mac OS X. You can snag it here. As a long time user of PhpMyAdmin for administering my databases, I am interested in whether or not MySQL admin can take it's place for my meager administration needs.

Now, I should point out up front I am by no means a big SQL nerd. I know only the basics that I have needed to know to administer my web pages and some basic data storage. This particular review covers its ability to replace a management package like PHPMyAdmin for people like myself with little SQL ability who need access to basic administrative tasks.

I stumbled across this app the other day while playing around with CocoaMySQL. CocoaMySQL did most of what I was looking for, but unfortunately didn't allow for GUI based user administration. Sure I could go in an edit the MySql table data, but that was so inelegant compared to PHPMyAdmin. Along comes MySql Administrator.

This program is capable of many things the PHPMyAdmin and CocoaMySQL are capable of, and much more. The functions of the program are broken down into 3 main focuses:

1. Gathering server info
Administrator gives you access to the startup and error logs for your MySQL server, info about the server itself, current connections and health reporting including traffic, queries, and memory health.

2. Administration
You can start and stop the server, set a wide variety of options to tune your setup including specific options for MyISAM or InnoDB, networking performance, replication and security. Also available are great backup and restore functionality.

3. Catalog Management
You can view, add, remove and edit table structures, schema and indices.

My aim was user management, and MySQL Administrator does an excellent job with this. Adding and removing users from various hosts is very easy, and assigning privileges is very straight forward. Just what I was looking for.

The backup and restore functions will be of particular interest to casual MySQL users as a simple and quick way to get functional backups of a running database. It offers a couple of different options for the execution with emphasis on data integrity for the type of tables you're running. The only weird thing here is that you have to create a “Backup Project” before you can back up anything which seemed a little strange to me. The Restore option allows for a full restore, or you can choose individual tables. Very handy.

You can edit Table structures within Administrator, but you can't edit table data. This is a function performed by MySQL Query Browser, which has not yet been ported to Mac. This means for manual data editing, you're back to PHPMyAdmin or CocoaMySQL, at least for the time being. MySql now has a cocoa programmer, so they are undoubtedly working on it.

Truth be told, for my light SQL needs, Administrator is much more than I need or would use consistently, but I will keep it around for convenient user management and backups. I'll continue to use CocoaMySQL for pushing my data around at least until the Query Browser is ported over. For middle to heavyweight SQL users, I'm sure this app would be a welcome addition to their toolkits making their lives a little easier day in and day out.