Installing and Testing MySQL - Database Design Manual: Using MySQL for Windows - page 11

Most of these directories are concerned with the function of the server and can be
ignored unless you specifically need to use them. The two directories of interest, however,
are the:

•

Docs directory, and the

•

bin directory.

The Docs directory contains the manual and other help files for using the server, and the
bin directory contains the executable files that you use to start and administer the server.
We will now explore these directories.

The Online MySQL Manual

If you need quick online reference about MySQL you can use the manual files that are
included in the installation. By default these are installed at:

C:\mysql\Docs

The files of note in this directory are:

•

manual_toc.html

•

manual.html

The manual_toc.html file is a web document that indexes the main manual.html file.
Searching this usually provides the answer that you are looking for. If not, try searching the
actual manual.html file itself. When this topic refers to the online MySQL manual, it is
referring to these files.

Starting the MySQL Service

The default the directory where all of MySQL's executable files are stored is

C:\mysql\bin

To start the MySQL service, double click on the winmysqladmin.exe file. Momentarily
the screen shown in Figure 2.3 will appear. Whenever the MySQL server is started on your
PC this screen will appear for a few moments and then hide itself. We will return to this
screen later.
The first time it is run the MySQL service will prompt you for some user credentials
for the administrative user. We need to provide a username and password so use the fol-
lowing:

User: root

Password: sasquatch