Writing Applications That Adapt to the MySQL Server Version
Problem
You want to use a given feature that is only available in a particular version of MySQL.
Solution
Ask the server for its version number. If the server is too old to support a given feature, maybe you can fall back to a workaround, if one exists.
Discussion
Each version of MySQL adds features. If you’re writing an application that requires certain features, check the server version to determine if they are present; if not, you must perform some sort of workaround (assuming there is one).
To get the server version, issue a
SELECT
VERSION()
statement. The result is a
string that looks something like 5.0.13-rc
or 4.1.10a
. In other words, it returns a string
consisting of major
, minor, and “teeny” version numbers,
possibly some letter at the end of the “teeny” version,
and possibly some suffix. The version string can be used as is for
presentation purposes if you want to produce a status display for the
user. However, for comparisons, it’s simpler to work with a number—in
particular, a five-digit number in Mmmtt
format, in which M
,
mm
, tt
are the
major, minor, and teeny version numbers. The conversion can be
performed by splitting the string at the periods, stripping off from
the third piece the suffix that begins with the first nonnumeric
character, and then joining the pieces. For example, 5.0.13-rc
. becomes 50013
, and 4.1.10a
becomes 40110
.
Here’s a Perl DBI function that takes a database handle argument and returns a ...
Get MySQL Cookbook, 2nd Edition now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.