Google Cloud/MySQL

To set up MySQL on Google Cloud, create a new project using the Google Cloud Platform Console.

Link to google cloud platform console: https://console.cloud.google.com/project

Setting up Google Cloud SDK

This uses the gcloud command line tool (see Google Cloud/Gcloud). This tool uses the Compute Engine API, so you have to enable that first. Also, need to install Google Cloud SDK (which installs the gcloud tool). There are also client libraries that allow you to write scripts in various languages.

Link to enabling compute engine API: https://console.cloud.google.com/flows/enableapi?apiid=compute_component

Link to google cloud sdk: https://cloud.google.com/sdk/docs/

Create MySQL Compute Instance

Manually Allocate Instance and Install MySQL

Start by setting up project:

$ gcloud config set project project-name

Set up compute zone:

$ gcloud config set compute --zone us-west1

Now to set up a MySQL server, create a compute instance. This sets up a plain, empty Debian VM that you can SSH to and install MySQL onto. Other operating systems are available too.

Create the instance:

$ gcloud instances create dummy

SSH to the instance:

$ gcloud compute ssh dummy

Install MySQL on the compute instance:

$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get -y install mysql-server

When you run the installation process, you will be prompted to set a root password.

Secure the installation using the MySQL command mysql_secure_installation:

$ sudo mysql_secure_installation

Connect to the server:

$ mysql --user=root --password

To do a "hello world" with MySQL, run the commands:

mysql> show processlist;

mysql> SELECT User, Host, Password FROM mysql.user;

Use Container

The other option here, which I suppose would bypass all of the Cloud SQL stuff, is to just use a Docker container and set up the SQL server yourself. This would use the Container Engine product instead.

Link to info about container engine: https://cloud.google.com/container-engine/

Link to container engine documentation: https://cloud.google.com/container-engine/docs/

Connect to MySQL Compute Instance

Once you've created the MySQL compute instance, you have a MySQL server running, and you can connect to the server using MySQL clients.

There are multiple ways to do this:

• Log into Google Cloud console, find the compute engine instance, and get a shell on the machine via the browser
• Connect to the MySQL server instance (in the cloud) from a MySQL client instance (on your local machine) by setting the proper connection parameters

How to connect to a remote MySQL server: MySQL#Get_a_remote_MySQL_shell (basically, just specify --host and --port arguments)

Now, can perform actions like creating a database, inserting sample data, etc.

mysql> CREATE DATABASE guestbook;

mysql> USE guestbook;

mysql> CREATE TABLE entries (guestName VARCHAR(255), content VARCHAR(255), 
    entryID INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, PRIMARY KEY(entryID));
    INSERT INTO entries (guestName, content) values ("first guest", "First!");
    INSERT INTO entries (guestName, content) values ("second guest", "What a jerk.");

mysql> SELECT * FROM entries;

Basic operations like configuring users [1] and creating databases [2] can be done using the standard MySQL client.

Connecting to MySQL Compute Instance from External Application

Can also connect to MySQL compute instance from an external application like JDBC (Java), Go, Docker, or a secure SSL proxy.

To connect via a secure SSL proxy, the client machine and server machine must both be running Cloud Proxy: https://cloud.google.com/sql/docs/mysql/sql-proxy

(NOTE: Not trivial to carry out successfully!)

Configuring Default User

Configure the default user account. By default, the default user is root.

Delete MySQL Compute Instance

Once you're finished with the MySQL server you'll want to delete the VM that was allocated. I am unable to find a way to do this using the gcloud interface.

$ gcloud compute instances delete dummy --zone us-west1

Link to gcloud documentation that mentions this command: https://cloud.google.com/compute/docs/gcloud-compute/