Question

I have two *.sql files that I use when creating a new web site database. The first file creates all the tables. The second file populates some default records. I would like to execute these files from PHP. I also use the Zend_Framework, if that will help accomplish this.

Additional Info

1. I don’t have console access
2. I’m trying to automate site generation from within our application.

SOLUTION

Using shell_exec()…

$command = 'mysql'
        . ' --host=' . $vals['db_host']
        . ' --user=' . $vals['db_user']
        . ' --password=' . $vals['db_pass']
        . ' --database=' . $vals['db_name']
        . ' --execute="SOURCE ' . $script_path
;
$output1 = shell_exec($command . '/site_db.sql"');
$output2 = shell_exec($command . '/site_structure.sql"');

…I never did get useful output, but followed some suggestions on another thread and finally got it all working. I switch to the --option=value format for the commands and used --execute="SOURCE ..." instead of < to execute the file.

Also, I never got a good explanation of the difference between shell_exec() and exec().

Answer 1

This question comes up from time to time. There’s no good solution for running a .sql script directly from PHP. There are edge cases where statements common in a .sql script can’t be executed as SQL statements. For example, the mysql tool has builtin commands that are not recognized by the MySQL Server, e.g. CONNECT, TEE, STATUS, and DELIMITER.

So I give +1 to @Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams’s answer. You should run your .sql script in PHP by invoking the mysql tool, for instance with shell_exec().

---

I got this test working:

$command = "mysql --user={$vals['db_user']} --password='{$vals['db_pass']}' "
 . "-h {$vals['db_host']} -D {$vals['db_name']} < {$script_path}";

$output = shell_exec($command . '/shellexec.sql');

---

See also my answers to these related questions:

• Loading .sql files from within PHP
• is it possible to call a sql script from a stored procedure in another sql script?
• PHP: multiple SQL queries in one mysql_query statement