Question

Still working my way around this, but is there any function/command I can use to set some simple variables?

Logging into mysql is quicker when I’m already ssh’d in, but typing in the full connection string is a bit annoying.

Any way to do something like:

mysql ${variable} dbname

Where variable would be something like -u user -p -h hostname

Or, is there another way to do what I need?

Answer 1

Create alias in your ~/.bash_profile (on the server). Changes in ~/.bash_profile will have effect the next time you log in.

For example add

alias conMy='mysql -u user -p -h hostname'  

And then use it via

ssh yourServer conMy dbname 

or when already logged on, just:

conMy dbname 

---

From the bash manpage:

alias [-p] [name[=value] …] Alias with no arguments or with the -p option prints the list of aliases in the form alias name=value on standard output. When arguments are supplied, an alias is defined for each name whose value is given. A trailing space in value causes the next word to be checked for alias substitution when the alias is expanded. For each name in the argument list for which no value is supplied, the name and value of the alias is printed. Alias returns true unless a name is given for which no alias has been defined.