Using phpMyAdmin

NOTE: You have root access to the MySQL database that stores all the data related to your Drupal website. DO NOT MAKE ANY CHANGES UNLESS YOU HAVE TESTED & VERIFIED BACKUPS OF YOUR DRUPAL WEBSITE.

This chapter of the ThetaJoin Hosting Guide is not meant to be detailed instructions on how to administer your Drupal database system. ThetaJoin can highly recommend the book - MySQL Administrator's Bible by Sheeri K. Cabral & Keith Murphy.

ThetaJoin servers are configured to provide MySQL database administration through your web browser using the industry standard phpMyAdmin interface. The URL to access phpMyAdmin is similar to https://www.example.com/phpmyadmin. When prompted, enter the TLS (SSL) username & password, then the Welcome to phpMyAdmin screen will appear.

 

Once logged in to phpMyAdmin, the opening screen provides full access to the MySQL database running on your ThetaJoin server. ThetaJoin allows full root access to your MySQL server because your ThetaJoin server is just that - yours. It's important to note that's imperative before you make any changes to your MySQL database, you have a full backup that has been tested, and verified to restore error free. The Drupal Backups page of the ThetaJoin Hosting Guide details how to create a MySQL backup, and restore the database too. 

Across the top of the page are many tabs for the different administrative tools to MySQL. The Database Tab shows all databases in your MySQL server.

 

Regular SQL statements can be run using the SQL Tab.

 

MySQL performance and configuration can be viewed using the Status and Variables Tabs.

 

 

 

phpMyAdmin displays the different character sets using the Charsets tab.

 

MySQL can use a number of different Storage Engines. View them with the Engines Tab.

 

 MySQL's extensive database security is administered through the Privileges Tab.

 

Each MySQL connection is a seperate process internally. This can be used to see what user connected to the MySQL database is doing, it's status, etc. Use the Processes Tab to view this information.

The ability to Export and Import MySQL databases is one way you can backup your Drupal site. Backups are covered in the Drupal Backups page of the ThetaJoin Hosting Guide.

Drupal is all about the underlying database. Viewing the structure of each Drupal database table can be done by clicking on the database name that's shown in the left hand menu.