Chapter 9 Language Structure

A string is a sequence of bytes or characters, enclosed within either single quote (') or double quote (") characters. Examples:

'a string'
"another string"

Quoted strings placed next to each other are concatenated to a single string. The following lines are equivalent:

'a string'
'a' ' ' 'string'

If the ANSI_QUOTES SQL mode is enabled, string literals can be quoted only within single quotation marks because a string quoted within double quotation marks is interpreted as an identifier.

A binary string is a string of bytes. Every binary string has a character set and collation named binary. A nonbinary string is a string of characters. It has a character set other than binary and a collation that is compatible with the character set.

For both types of strings, comparisons are based on the numeric values of the string unit. For binary strings, the unit is the byte; comparisons use numeric byte values. For nonbinary strings, the unit is the character and some character sets support multibyte characters; comparisons use numeric character code values. Character code ordering is a function of the string collation. (For more information, see Section 10.8.5, “The binary Collation Compared to _bin Collations”.)

A character string literal may have an optional character set introducer and COLLATE clause, to designate it as a string that uses a particular character set and collation:

[_charset_name]'string' [COLLATE collation_name]

Examples:

SELECT _latin1'string';
SELECT _binary'string';
SELECT _utf8'string' COLLATE utf8_danish_ci;

You can use N'literal' (or n'literal') to create a string in the national character set. These statements are equivalent:

SELECT N'some text';
SELECT n'some text';
SELECT _utf8'some text';

For information about these forms of string syntax, see Section 10.3.7, “The National Character Set”, and Section 10.3.8, “Character Set Introducers”.

Within a string, certain sequences have special meaning unless the NO_BACKSLASH_ESCAPES SQL mode is enabled. Each of these sequences begins with a backslash (\), known as the escape character. MySQL recognizes the escape sequences shown in Table 9.1, “Special Character Escape Sequences”. For all other escape sequences, backslash is ignored. That is, the escaped character is interpreted as if it was not escaped. For example, \x is just x. These sequences are case-sensitive. For example, \b is interpreted as a backspace, but \B is interpreted as B. Escape processing is done according to the character set indicated by the character_set_connection system variable. This is true even for strings that are preceded by an introducer that indicates a different character set, as discussed in Section 10.3.6, “Character String Literal Character Set and Collation”.

The ASCII 26 character can be encoded as \Z to enable you to work around the problem that ASCII 26 stands for END-OF-FILE on Windows. ASCII 26 within a file causes problems if you try to use mysql db_name < file_name.

The \% and \_ sequences are used to search for literal instances of % and _ in pattern-matching contexts where they would otherwise be interpreted as wildcard characters. See the description of the LIKE operator in Section 12.5.1, “String Comparison Functions”. If you use \% or \_ outside of pattern-matching contexts, they evaluate to the strings \% and \_, not to % and _.

There are several ways to include quote characters within a string:

The following SELECT statements demonstrate how quoting and escaping work:

mysql> SELECT 'hello', '"hello"', '""hello""', 'hel''lo', '\'hello';
+-------+---------+-----------+--------+--------+
| hello | "hello" | ""hello"" | hel'lo | 'hello |
+-------+---------+-----------+--------+--------+

mysql> SELECT "hello", "'hello'", "''hello''", "hel""lo", "\"hello";
+-------+---------+-----------+--------+--------+
| hello | 'hello' | ''hello'' | hel"lo | "hello |
+-------+---------+-----------+--------+--------+

mysql> SELECT 'This\nIs\nFour\nLines';
+--------------------+
| This
Is
Four
Lines |
+--------------------+

mysql> SELECT 'disappearing\ backslash';
+------------------------+
| disappearing backslash |
+------------------------+

To insert binary data into a string column (such as a BLOB column), you should represent certain characters by escape sequences. Backslash (\) and the quote character used to quote the string must be escaped. In certain client environments, it may also be necessary to escape NUL or Control+Z. The mysql client truncates quoted strings containing NUL characters if they are not escaped, and Control+Z may be taken for END-OF-FILE on Windows if not escaped. For the escape sequences that represent each of these characters, see Table 9.1, “Special Character Escape Sequences”.

When writing application programs, any string that might contain any of these special characters must be properly escaped before the string is used as a data value in an SQL statement that is sent to the MySQL server. You can do this in two ways:

Number literals include exact-value (integer and DECIMAL) literals and approximate-value (floating-point) literals.

Integers are represented as a sequence of digits. Numbers may include . as a decimal separator. Numbers may be preceded by - or + to indicate a negative or positive value, respectively. Numbers represented in scientific notation with a mantissa and exponent are approximate-value numbers.

Exact-value numeric literals have an integer part or fractional part, or both. They may be signed. Examples: 1, .2, 3.4, -5, -6.78, +9.10.

Approximate-value numeric literals are represented in scientific notation with a mantissa and exponent. Either or both parts may be signed. Examples: 1.2E3, 1.2E-3, -1.2E3, -1.2E-3.

Two numbers that look similar may be treated differently. For example, 2.34 is an exact-value (fixed-point) number, whereas 2.34E0 is an approximate-value (floating-point) number.

The DECIMAL data type is a fixed-point type and calculations are exact. In MySQL, the DECIMAL type has several synonyms: NUMERIC, DEC, FIXED. The integer types also are exact-value types. For more information about exact-value calculations, see Section 12.24, “Precision Math”.

The FLOAT and DOUBLE data types are floating-point types and calculations are approximate. In MySQL, types that are synonymous with FLOAT or DOUBLE are DOUBLE PRECISION and REAL.

An integer may be used in a floating-point context; it is interpreted as the equivalent floating-point number.

Date and time values can be represented in several formats, such as quoted strings or as numbers, depending on the exact type of the value and other factors. For example, in contexts where MySQL expects a date, it interprets any of '2015-07-21', '20150721', and 20150721 as a date.

This section describes the acceptable formats for date and time literals. For more information about the temporal data types, such as the range of permitted values, consult these sections:

Standard SQL and ODBC Date and Time Literals.  Standard SQL permits temporal literals to be specified using a type keyword and a string. The space between the keyword and string is optional.

DATE 'str'
TIME 'str'
TIMESTAMP 'str'

MySQL recognizes those constructions and also the corresponding ODBC syntax:

{ d 'str' }
{ t 'str' }
{ ts 'str' }

MySQL uses the type keyword and these constructions produce DATE, TIME, and DATETIME values, respectively, including a trailing fractional seconds part if specified. The TIMESTAMP syntax produces a DATETIME value in MySQL because DATETIME has a range that more closely corresponds to the standard SQL TIMESTAMP type, which has a year range from 0001 to 9999. (The MySQL TIMESTAMP year range is 1970 to 2038.)

String and Numeric Literals in Date and Time Context.  MySQL recognizes DATE values in these formats:

MySQL recognizes DATETIME and TIMESTAMP values in these formats:

A DATETIME or TIMESTAMP value can include a trailing fractional seconds part in up to microseconds (6 digits) precision. The fractional part should always be separated from the rest of the time by a decimal point; no other fractional seconds delimiter is recognized. For information about fractional seconds support in MySQL, see Section 11.3.6, “Fractional Seconds in Time Values”.

Dates containing two-digit year values are ambiguous because the century is unknown. MySQL interprets two-digit year values using these rules:

See also Section 11.3.8, “Two-Digit Years in Dates”.

For values specified as strings that include date part delimiters, it is unnecessary to specify two digits for month or day values that are less than 10. '2015-6-9' is the same as '2015-06-09'. Similarly, for values specified as strings that include time part delimiters, it is unnecessary to specify two digits for hour, minute, or second values that are less than 10. '2015-10-30 1:2:3' is the same as '2015-10-30 01:02:03'.

Values specified as numbers should be 6, 8, 12, or 14 digits long. If a number is 8 or 14 digits long, it is assumed to be in YYYYMMDD or YYYYMMDDHHMMSS format and that the year is given by the first 4 digits. If the number is 6 or 12 digits long, it is assumed to be in YYMMDD or YYMMDDHHMMSS format and that the year is given by the first 2 digits. Numbers that are not one of these lengths are interpreted as though padded with leading zeros to the closest length.

Values specified as nondelimited strings are interpreted according their length. For a string 8 or 14 characters long, the year is assumed to be given by the first 4 characters. Otherwise, the year is assumed to be given by the first 2 characters. The string is interpreted from left to right to find year, month, day, hour, minute, and second values, for as many parts as are present in the string. This means you should not use strings that have fewer than 6 characters. For example, if you specify '9903', thinking that represents March, 1999, MySQL converts it to the “zero” date value. This occurs because the year and month values are 99 and 03, but the day part is completely missing. However, you can explicitly specify a value of zero to represent missing month or day parts. For example, to insert the value '1999-03-00', use '990300'.

MySQL recognizes TIME values in these formats:

A trailing fractional seconds part is recognized in the 'D HH:MM:SS.fraction', 'HH:MM:SS.fraction', 'HHMMSS.fraction', and HHMMSS.fraction time formats, where fraction is the fractional part in up to microseconds (6 digits) precision. The fractional part should always be separated from the rest of the time by a decimal point; no other fractional seconds delimiter is recognized. For information about fractional seconds support in MySQL, see Section 11.3.6, “Fractional Seconds in Time Values”.

For TIME values specified as strings that include a time part delimiter, it is unnecessary to specify two digits for hours, minutes, or seconds values that are less than 10. '8:3:2' is the same as '08:03:02'.

Hexadecimal literal values are written using X'val' or 0xval notation, where val contains hexadecimal digits (0..9, A..F). Lettercase of the digits and of any leading X does not matter. A leading 0x is case-sensitive and cannot be written as 0X.

Legal hexadecimal literals:

X'01AF'
X'01af'
x'01AF'
x'01af'
0x01AF
0x01af

Illegal hexadecimal literals:

X'0G'   (G is not a hexadecimal digit)
0X01AF  (0X must be written as 0x)

Values written using X'val' notation must contain an even number of digits or a syntax error occurs. To correct the problem, pad the value with a leading zero:

mysql> SET @s = X'FFF';
ERROR 1064 (42000): You have an error in your SQL syntax;
check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server
version for the right syntax to use near 'X'FFF''

mysql> SET @s = X'0FFF';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)

Values written using 0xval notation that contain an odd number of digits are treated as having an extra leading 0. For example, 0xaaa is interpreted as 0x0aaa.

By default, a hexadecimal literal is a binary string, where each pair of hexadecimal digits represents a character:

mysql> SELECT X'4D7953514C', CHARSET(X'4D7953514C');
+---------------+------------------------+
| X'4D7953514C' | CHARSET(X'4D7953514C') |
+---------------+------------------------+
| MySQL         | binary                 |
+---------------+------------------------+
mysql> SELECT 0x5461626c65, CHARSET(0x5461626c65);
+--------------+-----------------------+
| 0x5461626c65 | CHARSET(0x5461626c65) |
+--------------+-----------------------+
| Table        | binary                |
+--------------+-----------------------+

A hexadecimal literal may have an optional character set introducer and COLLATE clause, to designate it as a string that uses a particular character set and collation:

[_charset_name] X'val' [COLLATE collation_name]

Examples:

SELECT _latin1 X'4D7953514C';
SELECT _utf8 0x4D7953514C COLLATE utf8_danish_ci;

The examples use X'val' notation, but 0xval notation permits introducers as well. For information about introducers, see Section 10.3.8, “Character Set Introducers”.

In numeric contexts, MySQL treats a hexadecimal literal like a BIGINT (64-bit integer). To ensure numeric treatment of a hexadecimal literal, use it in numeric context. Ways to do this include adding 0 or using CAST(... AS UNSIGNED). For example, a hexadecimal literal assigned to a user-defined variable is a binary string by default. To assign the value as a number, use it in numeric context:

mysql> SET @v1 = X'41';
mysql> SET @v2 = X'41'+0;
mysql> SET @v3 = CAST(X'41' AS UNSIGNED);
mysql> SELECT @v1, @v2, @v3;
+------+------+------+
| @v1  | @v2  | @v3  |
+------+------+------+
| A    |   65 |   65 |
+------+------+------+

An empty hexadecimal value (X'') evaluates to a zero-length binary string. Converted to a number, it produces 0:

mysql> SELECT CHARSET(X''), LENGTH(X'');
+--------------+-------------+
| CHARSET(X'') | LENGTH(X'') |
+--------------+-------------+
| binary       |           0 |
+--------------+-------------+
mysql> SELECT X''+0;
+-------+
| X''+0 |
+-------+
|     0 |
+-------+

The X'val' notation is based on standard SQL. The 0x notation is based on ODBC, for which hexadecimal strings are often used to supply values for BLOB columns.

To convert a string or a number to a string in hexadecimal format, use the HEX() function:

mysql> SELECT HEX('cat');
+------------+
| HEX('cat') |
+------------+
| 636174     |
+------------+
mysql> SELECT X'636174';
+-----------+
| X'636174' |
+-----------+
| cat       |
+-----------+

For hexadecimal literals, bit operations are considered numeric context, but bit operations permit numeric or binary string arguments in MySQL 8.0 and higher. To explicitly specify binary string context for hexadecimal literals, use a _binary introducer for at least one of the arguments:

mysql> SET @v1 = X'000D' | X'0BC0';
mysql> SET @v2 = _binary X'000D' | X'0BC0';
mysql> SELECT HEX(@v1), HEX(@v2);
+----------+----------+
| HEX(@v1) | HEX(@v2) |
+----------+----------+
| BCD      | 0BCD     |
+----------+----------+

The displayed result appears similar for both bit operations, but the result without _binary is a BIGINT value, whereas the result with _binary is a binary string. Due to the difference in result types, the displayed values differ: High-order 0 digits are not displayed for the numeric result.

Bit-value literals are written using b'val' or 0bval notation. val is a binary value written using zeros and ones. Lettercase of any leading b does not matter. A leading 0b is case sensitive and cannot be written as 0B.

Legal bit-value literals:

b'01'
B'01'
0b01

Illegal bit-value literals:

b'2'    (2 is not a binary digit)
0B01    (0B must be written as 0b)

By default, a bit-value literal is a binary string:

mysql> SELECT b'1000001', CHARSET(b'1000001');
+------------+---------------------+
| b'1000001' | CHARSET(b'1000001') |
+------------+---------------------+
| A          | binary              |
+------------+---------------------+
mysql> SELECT 0b1100001, CHARSET(0b1100001);
+-----------+--------------------+
| 0b1100001 | CHARSET(0b1100001) |
+-----------+--------------------+
| a         | binary             |
+-----------+--------------------+

A bit-value literal may have an optional character set introducer and COLLATE clause, to designate it as a string that uses a particular character set and collation:

[_charset_name] b'val' [COLLATE collation_name]

Examples:

SELECT _latin1 b'1000001';
SELECT _utf8 0b1000001 COLLATE utf8_danish_ci;

The examples use b'val' notation, but 0bval notation permits introducers as well. For information about introducers, see Section 10.3.8, “Character Set Introducers”.

In numeric contexts, MySQL treats a bit literal like an integer. To ensure numeric treatment of a bit literal, use it in numeric context. Ways to do this include adding 0 or using CAST(... AS UNSIGNED). For example, a bit literal assigned to a user-defined variable is a binary string by default. To assign the value as a number, use it in numeric context:

mysql> SET @v1 = b'1100001';
mysql> SET @v2 = b'1100001'+0;
mysql> SET @v3 = CAST(b'1100001' AS UNSIGNED);
mysql> SELECT @v1, @v2, @v3;
+------+------+------+
| @v1  | @v2  | @v3  |
+------+------+------+
| a    |   97 |   97 |
+------+------+------+

An empty bit value (b'') evaluates to a zero-length binary string. Converted to a number, it produces 0:

mysql> SELECT CHARSET(b''), LENGTH(b'');
+--------------+-------------+
| CHARSET(b'') | LENGTH(b'') |
+--------------+-------------+
| binary       |           0 |
+--------------+-------------+
mysql> SELECT b''+0;
+-------+
| b''+0 |
+-------+
|     0 |
+-------+

Bit-value notation is convenient for specifying values to be assigned to BIT columns:

mysql> CREATE TABLE t (b BIT(8));
mysql> INSERT INTO t SET b = b'11111111';
mysql> INSERT INTO t SET b = b'1010';
mysql> INSERT INTO t SET b = b'0101';

Bit values in result sets are returned as binary values, which may not display well. To convert a bit value to printable form, use it in numeric context or use a conversion function such as BIN() or HEX(). High-order 0 digits are not displayed in the converted value.

mysql> SELECT b+0, BIN(b), OCT(b), HEX(b) FROM t;
+------+----------+--------+--------+
| b+0  | BIN(b)   | OCT(b) | HEX(b) |
+------+----------+--------+--------+
|  255 | 11111111 | 377    | FF     |
|   10 | 1010     | 12     | A      |
|    5 | 101      | 5      | 5      |
+------+----------+--------+--------+

For bit literals, bit operations are considered numeric context, but bit operations permit numeric or binary string arguments in MySQL 8.0 and higher. To explicitly specify binary string context for bit literals, use a _binary introducer for at least one of the arguments:

mysql> SET @v1 = b'000010101' | b'000101010';
mysql> SET @v2 = _binary b'000010101' | _binary b'000101010';
mysql> SELECT HEX(@v1), HEX(@v2);
+----------+----------+
| HEX(@v1) | HEX(@v2) |
+----------+----------+
| 3F       | 003F     |
+----------+----------+

The displayed result appears similar for both bit operations, but the result without _binary is a BIGINT value, whereas the result with _binary is a binary string. Due to the difference in result types, the displayed values differ: High-order 0 digits are not displayed for the numeric result.

The constants TRUE and FALSE evaluate to 1 and 0, respectively. The constant names can be written in any lettercase.

mysql> SELECT TRUE, true, FALSE, false;
        -> 1, 1, 0, 0

The NULL value means “no data.” NULL can be written in any lettercase.

Be aware that the NULL value is different from values such as 0 for numeric types or the empty string for string types. For more information, see Section B.6.4.3, “Problems with NULL Values”.

For text file import or export operations performed with LOAD DATA or SELECT ... INTO OUTFILE, NULL is represented by the \N sequence. See Section 13.2.7, “LOAD DATA Syntax”.

For sorting with ORDER BY, NULL values sort before other values for ascending sorts, after other values for descending sorts.

Object names may be unqualified or qualified. An unqualified name is permitted in contexts where interpretation of the name is unambiguous. A qualified name includes at least one qualifier to clarify the interpretive context by overriding a default context or providing missing context.

For example, this statement creates a table using the unqualified name t1:

CREATE TABLE t1 (i INT);

Because t1 includes no qualifier to specify a database, the statement creates the table in the default database. If there is no default database, an error occurs.

This statement creates a table using the qualified name db1.t1:

CREATE TABLE db1.t1 (i INT);

Because db1.t1 includes a database qualifier db1, the statement creates t1 in the database named db1, regardless of the default database. The qualifier must be specified if there is no default database. The qualifier may be specified if there is a default database, to specify a database different from the default, or to make the database explicit if the default is the same as the one specified.

Qualifiers have these characteristics:

The permitted qualifiers for object names depend on the object type:

You need not specify a qualifier for an object reference in a statement unless the unqualified reference is ambiguous. Suppose that column c1 occurs only in table t1, c2 only in t2, and c in both t1 and t2. Any unqualified reference to c is ambiguous in a statement that refers to both tables and must be qualified as t1.c or t2.c to indicate which table you mean:

SELECT c1, c2, t1.c FROM t1 INNER JOIN t2
WHERE t2.c > 100;

Similarly, to retrieve from a table t in database db1 and from a table t in database db2 in the same statement, you must qualify the table references: For references to columns in those tables, qualifiers are required only for column names that appear in both tables. Suppose that column c1 occurs only in table db1.t, c2 only in db2.t, and c in both db1.t and db2.t. In this case, c is ambiguous and must be qualified but c1 and c2 need not be:

SELECT c1, c2, db1.t.c FROM db1.t INNER JOIN db2.t
WHERE db2.t.c > 100;

Table aliases enable qualified column references to be written more simply:

SELECT c1, c2, t1.c FROM db1.t AS t1 INNER JOIN db2.t AS t2
WHERE t2.c > 100;

In MySQL, databases correspond to directories within the data directory. Each table within a database corresponds to at least one file within the database directory (and possibly more, depending on the storage engine). Triggers also correspond to files. Consequently, the case sensitivity of the underlying operating system plays a part in the case sensitivity of database, table, and trigger names. This means such names are not case-sensitive in Windows, but are case-sensitive in most varieties of Unix. One notable exception is macOS, which is Unix-based but uses a default file system type (HFS+) that is not case-sensitive. However, macOS also supports UFS volumes, which are case-sensitive just as on any Unix. See Section 1.8.1, “MySQL Extensions to Standard SQL”. The lower_case_table_names system variable also affects how the server handles identifier case sensitivity, as described later in this section.

mysql> SELECT * FROM my_table WHERE MY_TABLE.col=1;

Column, index, stored routine, event, and resource group names are not case-sensitive on any platform, nor are column aliases.

However, names of logfile groups are case-sensitive. This differs from standard SQL.

By default, table aliases are case-sensitive on Unix, but not so on Windows or macOS. The following statement would not work on Unix, because it refers to the alias both as a and as A:

mysql> SELECT col_name FROM tbl_name AS a
       WHERE a.col_name = 1 OR A.col_name = 2;

However, this same statement is permitted on Windows. To avoid problems caused by such differences, it is best to adopt a consistent convention, such as always creating and referring to databases and tables using lowercase names. This convention is recommended for maximum portability and ease of use.

How table and database names are stored on disk and used in MySQL is affected by the lower_case_table_names system variable. lower_case_table_names can take the values shown in the following table. This variable does not affect case sensitivity of trigger identifiers. On Unix, the default value of lower_case_table_names is 0. On Windows, the default value is 1. On macOS, the default value is 2.

lower_case_table_names can only be configured when initializing the server. Changing the lower_case_table_names setting after the server is initialized is prohibited.

If you are using MySQL on only one platform, you do not normally have to use a lower_case_table_names setting other than the default. However, you may encounter difficulties if you want to transfer tables between platforms that differ in file system case sensitivity. For example, on Unix, you can have two different tables named my_table and MY_TABLE, but on Windows these two names are considered identical. To avoid data transfer problems arising from lettercase of database or table names, you have two options:

Object names may be considered duplicates if their uppercase forms are equal according to a binary collation. That is true for names of cursors, conditions, procedures, functions, savepoints, stored routine parameters, stored program local variables, and plugins. It is not true for names of columns, constraints, databases, partitions, statements prepared with PREPARE, tables, triggers, users, and user-defined variables.

File system case sensitivity can affect searches in string columns of INFORMATION_SCHEMA tables. For more information, see Section 10.8.7, “Using Collation in INFORMATION_SCHEMA Searches”.

There is a correspondence between database and table identifiers and names in the file system. For the basic structure, MySQL represents each database as a directory in the data directory, and depending upon the storage engine, each table may be represented by one or more files in the appropriate database directory.

For the data and index files, the exact representation on disk is storage engine specific. These files may be stored in the database directory, or the information may be stored in a separate file. InnoDB data is stored in the InnoDB data files. If you are using tablespaces with InnoDB, then the specific tablespace files you create are used instead.

Any character is legal in database or table identifiers except ASCII NUL (X'00'). MySQL encodes any characters that are problematic in the corresponding file system objects when it creates database directories or table files:

On Windows, some names such as nul, prn, and aux are encoded by appending @@@ to the name when the server creates the corresponding file or directory. This occurs on all platforms for portability of the corresponding database object between platforms.

MySQL supports built-in (native) functions, user-defined functions (UDFs), and stored functions. This section describes how the server recognizes whether the name of a built-in function is used as a function call or as an identifier, and how the server determines which function to use in cases when functions of different types exist with a given name.

SELECT COUNT(*) FROM mytable;
CREATE TABLE count (i INT);

SET sql_mode = 'IGNORE_SPACE';

SET sql_mode = 'ANSI';