If you're just getting started with MySQL, here are the basic commands to work with your database.

Starting MySQL:
To start MySQL, type in the command:

mysqld-nt --defaults-file="INIFILENAME"

You can put that in as a service, as long as you give the full proper path before both the executable name and the defaults file name.

To monitor what MySQL is doing, go to a command prompt and type:

mysql -u root -p

the system will prompt you for the root password, and then give you a

mysql>

prompt. You can now type in commands to mysql, to find out its health. When you're done, type in

quit

to get out of the tool.

from the command line you can also type

net stop mysql
net start mysql

to start and stop the mysql service, assuming you have the service set up properly with that name.