How to run SQL commands without java?

Question

I just started taking my first steps in SQL.
I downloaded and installed XAMPP 1.8.3-3, and also downloaded the JDBC driver and wrote this code:

import java.sql.Connection;
import java.sql.ResultSet;
import java.sql.SQLException;
import java.sql.Statement;

import com.mysql.jdbc.jdbc2.optional.MysqlConnectionPoolDataSource;
import com.mysql.jdbc.jdbc2.optional.MysqlDataSource;

public class TestSQL {
    
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Connection connection=null;     
        
        try {
            MysqlDataSource ds=new MysqlConnectionPoolDataSource();
            ds.setServerName("localhost");
            connection=ds.getConnection("root", "");
            Statement statement=connection.createStatement();
            statement.execute("CREATE DATABASE my_database;");
            statement.execute("USE my_database;");
            statement.execute("CREATE TABLE my_table (" +
                                "private_name VARCHAR(10)," +
                                "last_name VARCHAR(10)," +
                                "age INT" +
                                ");");
            statement.execute("INSERT INTO my_table" +
                    "(private_name,last_name,age)" +
                    "VALUES " +
                    "('Ariel','Menashe',29)");
            statement.execute("INSERT INTO my_table" +
                    "(private_name,last_name,age)" +
                    "VALUES " +
                    "('Aviad','Ganon',28)");
            statement.execute("INSERT INTO my_table" +
                    "(private_name,last_name,age)" +
                    "VALUES " +
                    "('Oren','Vanunu',30)");
            ResultSet rs=statement.executeQuery("SELECT * FROM my_table");
            
            while (rs.next()) {
                System.out.println("Mr. "+rs.getString("last_name")+", "+rs.getInt("age"));
            }
            
            connection.close();
        } catch (SQLException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
}

This code will compile and run, but my question is, how do I write code in SQL without Java? Can I run SQL commands through the terminal independently somehow?

Answer 1

Sure you can. If you have the MySQL command line client installed, you can start it up in a terminal and run any SQL command you like. Type this in your terminal:

mysql databasename -h host -u username -p

It will ask for the password interactively. If your database is on the same server as the client, you can leave off the -h host part.