Question

I have found following code in mysql documentation but wondering what does it mean putting backslash at the end of line.

status = mysql_query(mysql,
                     "DROP TABLE IF EXISTS test_table;\
                      CREATE TABLE test_table(id INT);\
                      INSERT INTO test_table VALUES(10);\
                      UPDATE test_table SET id=20 WHERE id=10;\
                      SELECT * FROM test_table;\
                      DROP TABLE test_table");

Answer 1

In the context of line-oriented text, especially source code for some programming languages, it is often used at the end of a line to indicate that the trailing newline character should be ignored, so that the following line is treated as if it were part of the current line. In this context it may be called a “continuation”. The GNU make manual says, “We split each long line into two lines using backslash-newline; this is like using one long line, but is easier to read.”