mysqldump - a database backup program

NAME

       mysqldump - a database backup program

SYNOPSIS

       mysqldump [options] [db_name [tbl_name ...]]

DESCRIPTION

The mysqldump client is a backup program originally written by Igor
Romanenko. It can be used to dump a database or a collection of
databases for backup or transfer to another SQL server (not necessarily
a MySQL server). The dump typically contains SQL statements to create
the table, populate it, or both. However, mysqldump can also be used to
generate files in CSV, other delimited text, or XML format.

If you are doing a backup on the server and your tables all are MyISAM
tables, consider using the mysqlhotcopy instead because it can
accomplish faster backups and faster restores. See mysqlhotcopy(1).

There are three general ways to invoke mysqldump:

shell> mysqldump [options] db_name [tbl_name ...]
shell> mysqldump [options] --databases db_name ...
shell> mysqldump [options] --all-databases

If you do not name any tables following db_name or if you use the
--databases or --all-databases option, entire databases are dumped.

mysqldump does not dump the INFORMATION_SCHEMA database by default. As
of MySQL 5.1.38, mysqldump dumps INFORMATION_SCHEMA if you name it
explicitly on the command line, although currently you must also use
the --skip-lock-tables option. Before 5.1.38, mysqldump silently
ignores INFORMATION_SCHEMA even if you name it explicitly on the
command line.

To see a list of the options your version of mysqldump supports,
execute mysqldump --help.

Some mysqldump options are shorthand for groups of other options:

o Use of --opt is the same as specifying --add-drop-table,
--add-locks, --create-options, --disable-keys, --extended-insert,
--lock-tables, --quick, and --set-charset. All of the options that
--opt stands for also are on by default because --opt is on by
default.

o Use of --compact is the same as specifying --skip-add-drop-table,
--skip-add-locks, --skip-comments, --skip-disable-keys, and
--skip-set-charset options.

To reverse the effect of a group option, uses its --skip-xxx form
(--skip-opt or --skip-compact). It is also possible to select only part
of the effect of a group option by following it with options that
enable or disable specific features. Here are some examples:

o To select the effect of --opt except for some features, use the
--skip option for each feature. To disable extended inserts and
memory buffering, use --opt --skip-extended-insert --skip-quick.
(Actually, --skip-extended-insert --skip-quick is sufficient
because --opt is on by default.)

o To reverse --opt for all features except index disabling and table
locking, use --skip-opt --disable-keys --lock-tables.

When you selectively enable or disable the effect of a group option,
order is important because options are processed first to last. For
example, --disable-keys --lock-tables --skip-opt would not have the
intended effect; it is the same as --skip-opt by itself.

mysqldump can retrieve and dump table contents row by row, or it can
retrieve the entire content from a table and buffer it in memory before
dumping it. Buffering in memory can be a problem if you are dumping
large tables. To dump tables row by row, use the --quick option (or
--opt, which enables --quick). The --opt option (and hence --quick) is
enabled by default, so to enable memory buffering, use --skip-quick.

If you are using a recent version of mysqldump to generate a dump to be
reloaded into a very old MySQL server, you should not use the --opt or
--extended-insert option. Use --skip-opt instead.

Note
mysqldump from MySQL 5.1.21 cannot be used to create dumps from
MySQL server 5.1.20 and older. This issue is fixed in MySQL 5.1.22.
(Bug#30123[1])

mysqldump supports the following options, which can be specified on the
command line or in the [mysqldump] and [client] option file groups.
mysqldump also supports the options for processing option files
described at Section 4.2.3.3.1, "Command-Line Options that Affect
Option-File Handling".

o --help, -?

Display a help message and exit.

o --add-drop-database

Add a DROP DATABASE statement before each CREATE DATABASE
statement. This option is typically used in conjunction with the
--all-databases or --databases option because no CREATE DATABASE
statements are written unless one of those options is specified.

o --add-drop-table

Add a DROP TABLE statement before each CREATE TABLE statement.

o --add-locks

Surround each table dump with LOCK TABLES and UNLOCK TABLES
statements. This results in faster inserts when the dump file is
reloaded. See Section 7.2.21, "Speed of INSERT Statements".

o --all-databases, -A

Dump all tables in all databases. This is the same as using the
--databases option and naming all the databases on the command
line.

o --all-tablespaces, -Y

Adds to a table dump all SQL statements needed to create any
tablespaces used by an NDBCLUSTER table. This information is not
otherwise included in the output from mysqldump. This option is
currently relevant only to MySQL Cluster tables.

This option was added in MySQL 5.1.6.

o --allow-keywords

Allow creation of column names that are keywords. This works by
prefixing each column name with the table name.

o --character-sets-dir=path

The directory where character sets are installed. See Section 9.5,
"Character Set Configuration".

o --comments, -i

Write additional information in the dump file such as program
version, server version, and host. This option is enabled by
default. To suppress this additional information, use
--skip-comments.

o --compact

Produce more compact output. This option enables the
--skip-add-drop-table, --skip-add-locks, --skip-comments,
--skip-disable-keys, and --skip-set-charset options.

Note
Prior to MySQL 5.1.21, this option did not create valid SQL if
the database dump contained views. The recreation of views
requires the creation and removal of temporary tables and this
option suppressed the removal of those temporary tables. As a
workaround, use --compact with the --add-drop-table option and
then manually adjust the dump file.

o --compatible=name

Produce output that is more compatible with other database systems
or with older MySQL servers. The value of name can be ansi,
mysql323, mysql40, postgresql, oracle, mssql, db2, maxdb,
no_key_options, no_table_options, or no_field_options. To use
several values, separate them by commas. These values have the same
meaning as the corresponding options for setting the server SQL
mode. See Section 5.1.7, "Server SQL Modes".

This option does not guarantee compatibility with other servers. It
only enables those SQL mode values that are currently available for
making dump output more compatible. For example,
--compatible=oracle does not map data types to Oracle types or use
Oracle comment syntax.

This option requires a server version of 4.1.0 or higher. With
older servers, it does nothing.

o --complete-insert, -c

Use complete INSERT statements that include column names.

o --compress, -C

Compress all information sent between the client and the server if
both support compression.

o --create-options

Include all MySQL-specific table options in the CREATE TABLE
statements.

o --databases, -B

Dump several databases. Normally, mysqldump treats the first name
argument on the command line as a database name and following names
as table names. With this option, it treats all name arguments as
database names. CREATE DATABASE and USE statements are included in
the output before each new database.

o --debug[=debug_options], -# [debug_options]

Write a debugging log. A typical debug_options string is
'd:t:o,file_name'. The default value is
'd:t:o,/tmp/mysqldump.trace'.

o --debug-check

Print some debugging information when the program exits. This
option was added in MySQL 5.1.21.

o --debug-info

Print debugging information and memory and CPU usage statistics
when the program exits. This option was added in MySQL 5.1.14.

o --default-character-set=charset_name

Use charset_name as the default character set. See Section 9.5,
"Character Set Configuration". If no character set is specified,
mysqldump uses utf8, and earlier versions use latin1.

Prior to MySQL 5.1.38, this option has no effect for output data
files produced by using the --tab option. See the description for
that option.

o --delayed-insert

Write INSERT DELAYED statements rather than INSERT statements.

o --delete-master-logs

On a master replication server, delete the binary logs by sending a
PURGE BINARY LOGS statement to the server after performing the dump
operation. This option automatically enables --master-data.

o --disable-keys, -K

For each table, surround the INSERT statements with /*!40000 ALTER
TABLE tbl_name DISABLE KEYS */; and /*!40000 ALTER TABLE tbl_name
ENABLE KEYS */; statements. This makes loading the dump file faster
because the indexes are created after all rows are inserted. This
option is effective only for nonunique indexes of MyISAM tables.

o --dump-date

If the --comments option is given, mysqldump produces a comment at
the end of the dump of the following form:

-- Dump completed on DATE

However, the date causes dump files taken at different times to
appear to be different, even if the data are otherwise identical.
--dump-date and --skip-dump-date control whether the date is added
to the comment. The default is --dump-date (include the date in the
comment). --skip-dump-date suppresses date printing. This option
was added in MySQL 5.1.23.

o --events, -E

Include Event Scheduler events for the dumped databases in the
output. This option was added in MySQL 5.1.8.

o --extended-insert, -e

Use multiple-row INSERT syntax that include several VALUES lists.
This results in a smaller dump file and speeds up inserts when the
file is reloaded.

o --fields-terminated-by=..., --fields-enclosed-by=...,
--fields-optionally-enclosed-by=..., --fields-escaped-by=...

These options are used with the --tab option and have the same
meaning as the corresponding FIELDS clauses for LOAD DATA INFILE.
See Section 12.2.6, "LOAD DATA INFILE Syntax".

o --first-slave

Deprecated. Use --lock-all-tables instead. --first-slave is
removed in MySQL 5.5.

o --flush-logs, -F

Flush the MySQL server log files before starting the dump. This
option requires the RELOAD privilege. If you use this option in
combination with the --all-databases option, the logs are flushed
for each database dumped. The exception is when using
--lock-all-tables or --master-data: In this case, the logs are
flushed only once, corresponding to the moment that all tables are
locked. If you want your dump and the log flush to happen at
exactly the same moment, you should use --flush-logs together with
either --lock-all-tables or --master-data.

o --flush-privileges

Send a FLUSH PRIVILEGES statement to the server after dumping the
mysql database. This option should be used any time the dump
contains the mysql database and any other database that depends on
the data in the mysql database for proper restoration. This option
was added in MySQL 5.1.12.

o --force, -f

Continue even if an SQL error occurs during a table dump.

One use for this option is to cause mysqldump to continue executing
even when it encounters a view that has become invalid because the
definition refers to a table that has been dropped. Without
--force, mysqldump exits with an error message. With --force,
mysqldump prints the error message, but it also writes an SQL
comment containing the view definition to the dump output and
continues executing.

o --host=host_name, -h host_name

Dump data from the MySQL server on the given host. The default host
is localhost.

o --hex-blob

Dump binary columns using hexadecimal notation (for example, 'abc'
becomes 0x616263). The affected data types are BINARY, VARBINARY,
the BLOB types, and BIT.

o --ignore-table=db_name.tbl_name

Do not dump the given table, which must be specified using both the
database and table names. To ignore multiple tables, use this
option multiple times. This option also can be used to ignore
views.

o --insert-ignore

Write INSERT IGNORE statements rather than INSERT statements.

o --lines-terminated-by=...

This option is used with the --tab option and has the same meaning
as the corresponding LINES clause for LOAD DATA INFILE. See
Section 12.2.6, "LOAD DATA INFILE Syntax".

o --lock-all-tables, -x

Lock all tables across all databases. This is achieved by acquiring
a global read lock for the duration of the whole dump. This option
automatically turns off --single-transaction and --lock-tables.

o --lock-tables, -l

For each dumped database, lock all tables to be dumped before
dumping them. The tables are locked with READ LOCAL to allow
concurrent inserts in the case of MyISAM tables. For transactional
tables such as InnoDB, --single-transaction is a much better option
than --lock-tables because it does not need to lock the tables at
all.

Because --lock-tables locks tables for each database separately,
this option does not guarantee that the tables in the dump file are
logically consistent between databases. Tables in different
databases may be dumped in completely different states.

o --log-error=file_name

Log warnings and errors by appending them to the named file. The
default is to do no logging. This option was added in MySQL 5.1.18.

o --master-data[=value]

Use this option to dump a master replication server to produce a
dump file that can be used to set up another server as a slave of
the master. It causes the dump output to include a CHANGE MASTER TO
statement that indicates the binary log coordinates (file name and
position) of the dumped server. These are the master server
coordinates from which the slave should start replicating after you
load the dump file into the slave.

If the option value is 2, the CHANGE MASTER TO statement is written
as an SQL comment, and thus is informative only; it has no effect
when the dump file is reloaded. If the option value is 1, the
statement is not written as a comment and takes effect when the
dump file is reloaded. If no option value is specified, the default
value is 1.

This option requires the RELOAD privilege and the binary log must
be enabled.

The --master-data option automatically turns off --lock-tables. It
also turns on --lock-all-tables, unless --single-transaction also
is specified, in which case, a global read lock is acquired only
for a short time at the beginning of the dump (see the description
for --single-transaction). In all cases, any action on logs happens
at the exact moment of the dump.

It is also possible to set up a slave by dumping an existing slave
of the master. To do this, use the following procedure on the
existing slave:

1. Stop the slave's SQL thread and get its current status:

mysql> STOP SLAVE SQL_THREAD;
mysql> SHOW SLAVE STATUS;

2. From the output of the SHOW SLAVE STATUS statement, the binary
log coordinates of the master server from which the new slave
should start replicating are the values of the
Relay_Master_Log_File and Exec_Master_Log_Pos fields. Denote
those values as file_name and file_pos.

3. Dump the slave server:

shell> mysqldump --master-data=2 --all-databases > dumpfile

4. Restart the slave:

mysql> START SLAVE;

5. On the new slave, load the dump file:

shell> mysql < dumpfile

6. On the new slave, set the replication coordinates to those of
the master server obtained earlier:

mysql> CHANGE MASTER TO
-> MASTER_LOG_FILE = 'file_name', MASTER_LOG_POS = file_pos;

The CHANGE MASTER TO statement might also need other
parameters, such as MASTER_HOST to point the slave to the
correct master server host. Add any such parameters as
necessary.

o --no-autocommit

Enclose the INSERT statements for each dumped table within SET
autocommit = 0 and COMMIT statements.

o --no-create-db, -n

This option suppresses the CREATE DATABASE statements that are
otherwise included in the output if the --databases or
--all-databases option is given.

o --no-create-info, -t

Do not write CREATE TABLE statements that re-create each dumped
table.

Note
This option does not not exclude statements creating log file
groups or tablespaces from mysqldump output; in MySQL 5.1.14
and later, you can use the --no-tablespaces option for this
purpose.

o --no-data, -d

Do not write any table row information (that is, do not dump table
contents). This is useful if you want to dump only the CREATE TABLE
statement for the table (for example, to create an empty copy of
the table by loading the dump file).

o --no-set-names, -N

This has the same effect as --skip-set-charset.

o --no-tablespaces, -y

This option suppresses all CREATE LOGFILE GROUP and CREATE
TABLESPACE statements in the output of mysqldump.

This option was added in MySQL 5.1.14.

o --opt

This option is shorthand. It is the same as specifying
--add-drop-table --add-locks --create-options --disable-keys
--extended-insert --lock-tables --quick --set-charset. It should
give you a fast dump operation and produce a dump file that can be
reloaded into a MySQL server quickly.

The --opt option is enabled by default. Use --skip-opt to disable
it. See the discussion at the beginning of this section for
information about selectively enabling or disabling a subset of the
options affected by --opt.

o --order-by-primary

Dump each table's rows sorted by its primary key, or by its first
unique index, if such an index exists. This is useful when dumping
a MyISAM table to be loaded into an InnoDB table, but will make the
dump operation take considerably longer.

o --password[=password], -p[password]

The password to use when connecting to the server. If you use the
short option form (-p), you cannot have a space between the option
and the password. If you omit the password value following the
--password or -p option on the command line, mysqldump prompts for
one.

Specifying a password on the command line should be considered
insecure. See Section 5.3.2.2, "End-User Guidelines for Password
Security". You can use an option file to avoid giving the password
on the command line.

o --pipe, -W

On Windows, connect to the server via a named pipe. This option
applies only if the server supports named-pipe connections.

o --port=port_num, -P port_num

The TCP/IP port number to use for the connection.

o --protocol={TCP|SOCKET|PIPE|MEMORY}

The connection protocol to use for connecting to the server. It is
useful when the other connection parameters normally would cause a
protocol to be used other than the one you want. For details on the
allowable values, see Section 4.2.2, "Connecting to the MySQL
Server".

o --quick, -q

This option is useful for dumping large tables. It forces mysqldump
to retrieve rows for a table from the server a row at a time rather
than retrieving the entire row set and buffering it in memory
before writing it out.

o --quote-names, -Q

Quote identifiers (such as database, table, and column names)
within "`" characters. If the ANSI_QUOTES SQL mode is enabled,
identifiers are quoted within """ characters. This option is
enabled by default. It can be disabled with --skip-quote-names, but
this option should be given after any option such as --compatible
that may enable --quote-names.

o --replace

Write REPLACE statements rather than INSERT statements. This option
was added in MySQL 5.1.3.

o --result-file=file_name, -r file_name

Direct output to a given file. This option should be used on
Windows to prevent newline "\n" characters from being converted to
"\r\n" carriage return/newline sequences. The result file is
created and its previous contents overwritten, even if an error
occurs while generating the dump.

o --routines, -R

Included stored routines (procedures and functions) for the dumped
databases in the output. Use of this option requires the SELECT
privilege for the mysql.proc table. The output generated by using
--routines contains CREATE PROCEDURE and CREATE FUNCTION statements
to re-create the routines. However, these statements do not include
attributes such as the routine creation and modification
timestamps. This means that when the routines are reloaded, they
will be created with the timestamps equal to the reload time.

If you require routines to be re-created with their original
timestamp attributes, do not use --routines. Instead, dump and
reload the contents of the mysql.proc table directly, using a MySQL
account that has appropriate privileges for the mysql database.

This option was added in MySQL 5.1.2. Before that, stored routines
are not dumped. Routine DEFINER values are not dumped until MySQL
5.1.8. This means that before 5.1.8, when routines are reloaded,
they will be created with the definer set to the reloading user. If
you require routines to be re-created with their original definer,
dump and load the contents of the mysql.proc table directly as
described earlier.

o --set-charset

Add SET NAMES default_character_set to the output. This option is
enabled by default. To suppress the SET NAMES statement, use
--skip-set-charset.

o --single-transaction

This option sends a START TRANSACTION SQL statement to the server
before dumping data. It is useful only with transactional tables
such as InnoDB, because then it dumps the consistent state of the
database at the time when BEGIN was issued without blocking any
applications.

When using this option, you should keep in mind that only InnoDB
tables are dumped in a consistent state. For example, any MyISAM or
MEMORY tables dumped while using this option may still change
state.

While a --single-transaction dump is in process, to ensure a valid
dump file (correct table contents and binary log coordinates), no
other connection should use the following statements: ALTER TABLE,
CREATE TABLE, DROP TABLE, RENAME TABLE, TRUNCATE TABLE. A
consistent read is not isolated from those statements, so use of
them on a table to be dumped can cause the SELECT that is performed
by mysqldump to retrieve the table contents to obtain incorrect
contents or fail.

The --single-transaction option and the --lock-tables option are
mutually exclusive because LOCK TABLES causes any pending
transactions to be committed implicitly.

This option is not supported for MySQL Cluster tables; the results
cannot be guaranteed to be consistent due to the fact that the
NDBCLUSTER storage engine supports only the READ_COMMITTED
transaction isolation level. You should always use NDB backup and
restore instead.

To dump large tables, you should combine the --single-transaction
option with --quick.

o --skip-comments

See the description for the --comments option.

o --skip-opt

See the description for the --opt option.

o --socket=path, -S path

For connections to localhost, the Unix socket file to use, or, on
Windows, the name of the named pipe to use.

o --ssl*

Options that begin with --ssl specify whether to connect to the
server via SSL and indicate where to find SSL keys and
certificates. See Section 5.5.6.3, "SSL Command Options".

o --tab=path, -T path

Produce tab-separated text-format data files. For each dumped
table, mysqldump creates a tbl_name.sql file that contains the
CREATE TABLE statement that creates the table, and the server
writes a tbl_name.txt file that contains its data. The option value
is the directory in which to write the files.

Note
This option should be used only when mysqldump is run on the
same machine as the mysqld server. You must have the FILE
privilege, and the server must have permission to write files
in the directory that you specify.
By default, the .txt data files are formatted using tab characters
between column values and a newline at the end of each line. The
format can be specified explicitly using the --fields-xxx and
--lines-terminated-by options.

As of MySQL 5.1.38, column values are converted to the character
set specified by the --default-character-set option. Prior to
5.1.38 or if no such option is present, values are dumped using the
binary character set. In effect, there is no character set
conversion. If a table contains columns in several character sets,
the output data file will as well and you may not be able to reload
the file correctly.

o --tables

Override the --databases or -B option. mysqldump regards all name
arguments following the option as table names.

o --triggers

Include triggers for each dumped table in the output. This option
is enabled by default; disable it with --skip-triggers.

o --tz-utc

This option enables TIMESTAMP columns to be dumped and reloaded
between servers in different time zones. mysqldump sets its
connection time zone to UTC and adds SET TIME_ZONE='+00:00' to the
dump file. Without this option, TIMESTAMP columns are dumped and
reloaded in the time zones local to the source and destination
servers, which can cause the values to change if the servers are in
different time zones. --tz-utc also protects against changes due
to daylight saving time. --tz-utc is enabled by default. To
disable it, use --skip-tz-utc. This option was added in MySQL
5.1.2.

o --user=user_name, -u user_name

The MySQL user name to use when connecting to the server.

o --verbose, -v

Verbose mode. Print more information about what the program does.

o --version, -V

Display version information and exit.

o --where='where_condition', -w 'where_condition'

Dump only rows selected by the given WHERE condition. Quotes around
the condition are mandatory if it contains spaces or other
characters that are special to your command interpreter.

Examples:

--where="user='jimf'"
-w"userid>1"
-w"userid<1"

o --xml, -X

Write dump output as well-formed XML.

NULL, 'NULL', and Empty Values: For a column named column_name, the
NULL value, an empty string, and the string value 'NULL' are
distinguished from one another in the output generated by this
option as follows.

Beginning with MySQL 5.1.18, XML output from mysqldump includes the
XML namespace, as shown here:

shell> mysqldump --xml -u root world City
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<mysqldump xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
<database name="world">
<table_structure name="City">
<field Field="ID" Type="int(11)" Null="NO" Key="PRI" Extra="auto_increment" />
<field Field="Name" Type="char(35)" Null="NO" Key="" Default="" Extra="" />
<field Field="CountryCode" Type="char(3)" Null="NO" Key="" Default="" Extra="" />
<field Field="District" Type="char(20)" Null="NO" Key="" Default="" Extra="" />
<field Field="Population" Type="int(11)" Null="NO" Key="" Default="0" Extra="" />
<key Table="City" Non_unique="0" Key_name="PRIMARY" Seq_in_index="1" Column_name="ID"
Collation="A" Cardinality="4079" Null="" Index_type="BTREE" Comment="" />
<options Name="City" Engine="MyISAM" Version="10" Row_format="Fixed" Rows="4079"
Avg_row_length="67" Data_length="273293" Max_data_length="18858823439613951"
Index_length="43008" Data_free="0" Auto_increment="4080"
Create_time="2007-03-31 01:47:01" Update_time="2007-03-31 01:47:02"
Collation="latin1_swedish_ci" Create_options="" Comment="" />
</table_structure>
<table_data name="City">
<row>
<field name="ID">1</field>
<field name="Name">Kabul</field>
<field name="CountryCode">AFG</field>
<field name="District">Kabol</field>
<field name="Population">1780000</field>
</row>
...
<row>
<field name="ID">4079</field>
<field name="Name">Rafah</field>
<field name="CountryCode">PSE</field>
<field name="District">Rafah</field>
<field name="Population">92020</field>
</row>
</table_data>
</database>
</mysqldump>

You can also set the following variables by using --var_name=value
syntax:

o max_allowed_packet

The maximum size of the buffer for client/server communication. The
maximum is 1GB.

o net_buffer_length

The initial size of the buffer for client/server communication.
When creating multiple-row INSERT statements (as with the
--extended-insert or --opt option), mysqldump creates rows up to
net_buffer_length length. If you increase this variable, you should
also ensure that the net_buffer_length variable in the MySQL server
is at least this large.

A common use of mysqldump is for making a backup of an entire database:

shell> mysqldump db_name > backup-file.sql

You can load the dump file back into the server like this:

shell> mysql db_name < backup-file.sql

Or like this:

shell> mysql -e "source /path-to-backup/backup-file.sql" db_name

mysqldump is also very useful for populating databases by copying data
from one MySQL server to another:

shell> mysqldump --opt db_name | mysql --host=remote_host -C db_name

It is possible to dump several databases with one command:

shell> mysqldump --databases db_name1 [db_name2 ...] > my_databases.sql

To dump all databases, use the --all-databases option:

shell> mysqldump --all-databases > all_databases.sql

For InnoDB tables, mysqldump provides a way of making an online backup:

shell> mysqldump --all-databases --single-transaction > all_databases.sql

This backup acquires a global read lock on all tables (using FLUSH
TABLES WITH READ LOCK) at the beginning of the dump. As soon as this
lock has been acquired, the binary log coordinates are read and the
lock is released. If long updating statements are running when the
FLUSH statement is issued, the MySQL server may get stalled until those
statements finish. After that, the dump becomes lock free and does not
disturb reads and writes on the tables. If the update statements that
the MySQL server receives are short (in terms of execution time), the
initial lock period should not be noticeable, even with many updates.

For point-in-time recovery (also known as "roll-forward," when you need
to restore an old backup and replay the changes that happened since
that backup), it is often useful to rotate the binary log (see
Section 5.2.4, "The Binary Log") or at least know the binary log
coordinates to which the dump corresponds:

shell> mysqldump --all-databases --master-data=2 > all_databases.sql

Or:

shell> mysqldump --all-databases --flush-logs --master-data=2
> all_databases.sql

The --master-data and --single-transaction options can be used
simultaneously, which provides a convenient way to make an online
backup suitable for use prior to point-in-time recovery if tables are
stored using the InnoDB storage engine.

For more information on making backups, see Section 6.2, "Database
Backup Methods", and Section 6.3, "Example Backup and Recovery
Strategy".

If you encounter problems backing up views, please read the section
that covers restrictions on views which describes a workaround for
backing up views when this fails due to insufficient privileges. See
Section D.4, "Restrictions on Views".

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright (C) 1997, 2010, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights
       reserved.

       This documentation is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
       modify it only under the terms of the GNU General Public License as
       published by the Free Software Foundation; version 2 of the License.

       This documentation is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
       but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
       MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU
       General Public License for more details.

       You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along
       with the program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
       51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA or see
       http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

NOTES

        1. Bug#30123
           http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=30123

AUTHOR