The mysqlpump Utility

In this blog, we’ll look at the mysqlpump utility.

mysqlpump is a utility that performs logical backups (which means that backing up your data as SQL statements instead of a raw copy of data files). It was added in MySQL Server version 5.7.8 and can be used to dump a database or a set of databases to a file and then loaded on another SQL server (not necessarily a MySQL server).

Its usage is similar to mysqldump but it includes a new set of features. Many of the options are the same, but it was written from scratch to avoid being limited to mysqldump compatibility.

Main Features

The main features include the following.

• To make the dump process faster, it allows parallel processing of databases and objects within databases.
• There are more options to customize your dumps and choose which databases and objects to dump (i.e. tables, stored programs, and user accounts), using the --include-* and --exclude-* parameters.
• User accounts can be dumped now as CREATE USER and GRANT statements instead of inserting directly to the MySQL system database.
• Information between the client and the server can be compressed using the --compress option. This feature is very useful for remote backups, as it saves bandwidth time and transfer time. You can also compress the output file using --compress-output, which supports ZLIB and LZ4 compression algorithms.
• It has an estimated progress indicator. This is really useful for checking the current status of the dump process. You can see the total amount of rows dumped and the number of databases completed. It also reports an estimate of the total time to complete the dump.
• Creation of secondary indexes for InnoDB tables happens after data load for shorter load times.

Exclude/Include

This feature provides more control over customizing your dumps and filtering the data that you need. Using this feature, you can be more selective with the data you want to dump (i.e. databases, tables, triggers, events, routines, and users) and save file size, process time, and transfer time while copying and moving the file to another host.

Keep in mind that there are some options that are mutually exclusive. For example, if you use the --all-databases option, the --exclude-databases  parameter won’t take effect. By default, mysqlpump will not dump the following databases unless you specify them using the --include-databases option: INFORMATION_SCHEMA, performance_schema, ndbinfo, and sys.

Values for these options need to be declared by comma-separated listing. Using a % as a value for any of the exclude/include options acts as a wildcard. For example, you can dump all databases starting with t and p by adding the option --include-databases=t%,p% to the command line.

For users, routines, triggers, and events, mysqlpump has --include-* and --exclude-* options with similar usage. Some specific notes:

• Triggers are dumped by default but you can also filter them using the --include-triggers/ --exclude-triggers options.
• Routines and events are not dumped by default and need to be specified in the command line with --routines and --events or the corresponding --include and--exclude options.
• Keep in mind that if a stored procedure and a function have the same name, then include/exclude applies to both.

Parallel Processing

This feature allows you to process several databases and tables within the databases in parallel. By default, mysqlpump uses one processing queue with two threads. You can increase the number of threads for this default queue with --default-parallelism. Unless you create additional queues, all the databases and/or tables you elect to dump go through the default queue.

To create additional queues, you can use the --parallel-schemas option, which takes two parameters: the number of threads for the queue and the subset of databases this queue processes. As an example, you could run:

mysqlpump --include-databases=a,b,c,d,e,f,g,h --default-parallelism=3 --parallel-schemas=4:a,b

...so that schemas c, d, e, f, g, and h are processed by the default queue (which uses three threads), and then tables from schemas a and b are processed by a separate queue (that uses four threads). Database names should be included in a comma-separated list:

$ mysqlpump --parallel-schemas=4:example1,example2,example3 --parallel-schemas=3:example4,example5 > examples.sql
Dump progress: 0/1 tables, 250/261184 rows
Dump progress: 24/30 tables, 1204891/17893833 rows
Dump progress: 29/30 tables, 1755611/17893833 rows
Dump progress: 29/30 tables, 2309111/17893833 rows
...
Dump completed in 42424 milliseconds

User Accounts

User accounts can be dumped using this tool. Here’s a comparison of our Percona Tool pt-show-grants versus mysqlpump to check their differences.

By default, mysqlpump doesn’t dump user account definitions (even while dumping the MySQL database). To include user accounts on the dump, you must specify the --users option.

Here’s an example of how to use mysqlpump to get only user accounts dumped to a file:

$ mysqlpump --exclude-databases=% --exclude-triggers=% --users
-- Dump created by MySQL dump utility, version: 5.7.8-rc, linux-glibc2.5 (x86_64)
-- Dump start time: Thu Aug 27 17:10:10 2015
-- Server version: 5.7.8
SET @OLD_UNIQUE_CHECKS=@@UNIQUE_CHECKS, UNIQUE_CHECKS=0;
SET @OLD_FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=@@FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS, FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=0;
SET @OLD_TIME_ZONE=@@TIME_ZONE;
SET TIME_ZONE='+00:00';
SET @OLD_CHARACTER_SET_CLIENT=@@CHARACTER_SET_CLIENT;
SET @OLD_CHARACTER_SET_RESULTS=@@CHARACTER_SET_RESULTS;
SET @OLD_COLLATION_CONNECTION=@@COLLATION_CONNECTION;
SET NAMES utf8;
CREATE USER 'msandbox'@'127.%' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* TO 'msandbox'@'127.%';
CREATE USER 'msandbox_ro'@'127.%' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT SELECT, EXECUTE ON *.* TO 'msandbox_ro'@'127.%';
CREATE USER 'msandbox_rw'@'127.%' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, CREATE, DROP, INDEX, ALTER, SHOW DATABASES, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, LOCK TABLES, EXECUTE ON *.* TO 'msandbox_rw'@'127.%';
CREATE USER 'rsandbox'@'127.%' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*B07EB15A2E7BD9620DAE47B194D5B9DBA14377AD' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT REPLICATION SLAVE ON *.* TO 'rsandbox'@'127.%';
CREATE USER 'furrywall'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*AB8D50A9E3B8D1F3ACE85C54736B5BF472B44539' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT LOCK;
GRANT USAGE ON *.* TO 'furrywall'@'localhost';
CREATE USER 'msandbox'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* TO 'msandbox'@'localhost';
CREATE USER 'msandbox_ro'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT SELECT, EXECUTE ON *.* TO 'msandbox_ro'@'localhost';
CREATE USER 'msandbox_rw'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, CREATE, DROP, INDEX, ALTER, SHOW DATABASES, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, LOCK TABLES, EXECUTE ON *.* TO 'msandbox_rw'@'localhost';
CREATE USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6C387FC3893DBA1E3BA155E74754DA6682D04747' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE DEFAULT ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* TO 'root'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
CREATE USER 'testuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED WITH 'mysql_native_password' AS '*6E543F385210D9BD42A4FDB4BB23FD2C31C95462' REQUIRE NONE PASSWORD EXPIRE INTERVAL 30 DAY ACCOUNT UNLOCK;
GRANT USAGE ON *.* TO 'testuser'@'localhost';
SET TIME_ZONE=@OLD_TIME_ZONE;
SET CHARACTER_SET_CLIENT=@OLD_CHARACTER_SET_CLIENT;
SET CHARACTER_SET_RESULTS=@OLD_CHARACTER_SET_RESULTS;
SET COLLATION_CONNECTION=@OLD_COLLATION_CONNECTION;
SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=@OLD_FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS;
SET UNIQUE_CHECKS=@OLD_UNIQUE_CHECKS;
-- Dump end time: Thu Aug 27 17:10:10 2015
Dump completed in 823 milliseconds

As you can see, above the tool makes sure the session uses known values for timezone and character sets. This won’t affect users, it’s part of the dump process to ensure correctness while restoring on the destination.

Comparing it with  pt-show-grants from Percona Toolkit, we can see that mysqlpump dumps the CREATE USER information, as well. The statements produced by mysqlpump are the right thing to run to recreate users (and should be the preferred method), especially because of the sql_mode NO_AUTO_CREATE_USERS. If enabled, it renders pt-show-grants useless.

Here’s an example of pt-show-grants usage:

$ pt-show-grants --host 127.0.0.1 --port 5708 --user msandbox --ask-pass
Enter password:
-- Grants dumped by pt-show-grants
-- Dumped from server 127.0.0.1 via TCP/IP, MySQL 5.7.8-rc at 2015-08-27 17:06:52
-- Grants for 'furrywall'@'localhost'
GRANT USAGE ON *.* TO 'furrywall'@'localhost';
-- Grants for 'msandbox'@'127.%'
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* TO 'msandbox'@'127.%';
-- Grants for 'msandbox'@'localhost'
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* TO 'msandbox'@'localhost';
-- Grants for 'msandbox_ro'@'127.%'
GRANT EXECUTE, SELECT ON *.* TO 'msandbox_ro'@'127.%';
-- Grants for 'msandbox_ro'@'localhost'
GRANT EXECUTE, SELECT ON *.* TO 'msandbox_ro'@'localhost';
-- Grants for 'msandbox_rw'@'127.%'
GRANT ALTER, CREATE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, DELETE, DROP, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, SELECT, SHOW DATABASES, UPDATE ON *.* TO 'msandbox_rw'@'127.%';
-- Grants for 'msandbox_rw'@'localhost'
GRANT ALTER, CREATE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, DELETE, DROP, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, SELECT, SHOW DATABASES, UPDATE ON *.* TO 'msandbox_rw'@'localhost';
-- Grants for 'root'@'localhost'
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON *.* TO 'root'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
GRANT PROXY ON ''@'' TO 'root'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;
-- Grants for 'rsandbox'@'127.%'
GRANT REPLICATION SLAVE ON *.* TO 'rsandbox'@'127.%';
-- Grants for 'testuser'@'localhost'
GRANT USAGE ON *.* TO 'testuser'@'localhost';

Some Miscellaneous Notes

One of the differences with mysqldump is that mysqlpump adds CREATE DATABASE statements to the dump by default (unless specified with the --no-create-db option). There’s an important difference on the dump process that is closely related: it includes the database name while adding the CREATE TABLE statement. This causes a problem when trying to use the tool to create a duplicate.