Specifications

Dropping Tables

At times you may want to get rid of an entire table. You can do this with the DROP TABLE state-

ment. This is very simple, and it looks like this:

DROP TABLE table;

This will delete all the rows in the table and the table itself, so be careful using it.

Dropping a Whole Database

You can go even further and eliminate an entire database with the DROP DATABASE statement,

which looks like this:

DROP DATABASE database;

This will delete all the rows, all the tables, all the indexes, and the database itself, so it goes

without saying that you should be somewhat careful using this statement.

Further Reading

In this chapter, we have given an overview of the day-to-day SQL you will use when interact-

ing with a MySQL database. In the next two chapters, we will look at how to connect MySQL

and PHP so that you can access your database from the Web. We’ll also explore some

advanced MySQL techniques.

If you want to know more about SQL, you can always fall back on the ANSI SQL standard for

a little light reading. It’s available from

http://www.ansi.org/

For more detail on the MySQL extensions to ANSI SQL, you can look at the MySQL Web

site:

http://www.mysql.com

In Chapter 10, “Accessing Your MySQL Database from the Web with PHP,” we’ll cover how

you can make the Book-O-Rama database available over the Web.

Using MySQL

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