13.4 Configuring MySQL Shell Options

You can configure MySQL Shell to match your preferences, for example to start up to a certain programming language or to provide output in a particular format. Configuration options can be set for the current session only, or options can be set permanently by persisting changes to the MySQL Shell configuration file. Online help for all options is provided. You can configure options using the MySQL Shell \option command, which is available in all MySQL Shell modes for querying and changing configuration options. Alternatively in JavaScript and Python modes, use the shell.options object.

Valid Configuration Options

The following configuration options can be set using either the \option command or shell.options scripting interface:

optionName	DefaultValue	Type	Effect
autocomplete.nameCache	true	boolean	Enable database name caching for autocompletion.
batchContinueOnError	false	boolean (READ ONLY)	In SQL batch mode, force processing to continue if an error is found. Set to true by adding --force on the command line. See Appendix A, MySQL Shell Command Reference.
connectTimeout	10	float greater than 0	The time in seconds to wait before the connection of any session not using AdminAPI times out.
dba.connectTimeout	5	float greater than 0	The time in seconds to wait before the connection of any session using AdminAPI times out.
credentialStore.excludeFilters	empty	array	An array of URLs for which automatic password storage is disabled, supports glob characters * and ?.
credentialStore.helper	Depends on platform	string	Name of the credential helper used to fetch or store passwords. A special value default is supported to use the platform's default helper. The special value >disabled< disables the credential store.
credentialStore.savePasswords	prompt	string	Controls automatic password storage, supported values: always, prompt or never.
dba.connectivityChecks	true	boolean	Defines if connectivity checks are performed for cluster.addInstance(), clusterSet.createReplicaCluster(), and replicaSet.addInstance(), using the defined SSL configuration. If an SSL error occurs, the command stops and an error is returned.
dba.gtidWaitTimeout	60	integer greater than 0	The time in seconds to wait for GTID transactions to be applied, when required by AdminAPI operations. See Section 7.9, “Modifying or Dissolving an InnoDB Cluster”.
dba.logSql	0	integer ranging from 0 to 2	(Deprecated in MySQL Shell 8.0.30. Use logSql instead.) Log SQL statements that are executed by AdminAPI operations (see Chapter 12, MySQL Shell Logging and Debug).
dba.restartWaitTimeout	60	integer greater than 0	The time in seconds to wait for transactions to be applied during a recovery operation. Use to configure a longer timeout when a joining instance has to recover a large amount of data. See Section 7.4.6, “Using MySQL Clone with InnoDB Cluster”).
dba.versionCompatibilityChecks	true	boolean	Checks version compatibility for asynchronous replication when managing a ReplicaSet, ClusterSet, or a Cluster with Read-Replicas.
defaultCompress	false	boolean	Request compression for information sent between the client and the server in every global session. Affects classic MySQL protocol connections only (see Section 4.3.8, “Using Compressed Connections”).
defaultMode	None	string (sql, js or py)	The mode to use when MySQL Shell is started (SQL, JavaScript or Python).
devapi.dbObjectHandles	true	boolean	Enable table and collection name handles for the X DevAPI db object.
history.autoSave	false	boolean	Save (true) or clear (false) entries in the MySQL Shell code history when you exit the application (see Section 5.5, “Code History”).
history.maxSize	1000	integer	The maximum number of entries to store in the MySQL Shell code history.
history.sql.ignorePattern	*SELECT*:SHOW*	string	Strings that match these patterns are not added to the MySQL Shell code history.
history.sql.syslog	false	boolean	Send interactive SQL statements to the operating system’s system logging facility (see Section 12.3, “System Logging for User SQL Statements”).
logFile	Path to the MySQL Shell log file.	string	Displays the path to the MySQL Shell log file. (Read-only) This value can only be changed from the command line, using the --log-file=path/to/logfile.log option. See Appendix A, MySQL Shell Command Reference.
logLevel	info	integer ranging from 1 to 8 or any of none, internal, error, warning, info, debug, debug2, debug3, respectively	Set a logging level for the application log (see Chapter 12, MySQL Shell Logging and Debug).
logSql	error	string (off, error, on, all)	Log SQL statements that are executed by MySQL Shell operations (see Section 12.4, “MySQL Shell SQL Logging”). This log option does not log user SQL statements executed interactively from the SQL mode, only SQL statements executed by MySQL Shell operations. Logs all SQL statements except those defined in the logSql.ignorePatternUnsafe and logSql.ignorePattern options. off: no SQL statements are logged. error: only SQL statements with error messages are logged when an error occurs. on: logs all SQL statements except those defined in the logSql.ignorePatternUnsafe and logSql.ignorePattern options. all: logs all SQL statements except those defined in logSql.ignorePatternUnsafe.
logSql.ignorePattern	*SELECT*:*SHOW*	string	Colon-separated list of glob pattern to filter out of SQL statements logged by logSql (see Section 12.4, “MySQL Shell SQL Logging”).
logSql.ignorePatternUnsafe	*IDENTIFIED*:*PASSWORD*	string	Colon-separated list of statement patterns to filter out of SQL statements logged by logSql (see Section 12.4, “MySQL Shell SQL Logging”).
mysqlPluginDir	MySQL Shell's MySQL plugin directory. That is, the lib/mysql/plugins directory of your MySQL Shell installation on Linux platforms, and lib\mysql\plugins on Windows platforms.	string	Set a persistent path to a plugin directory.
oci.configFile	The default location for your platform.	string	Set a persistent path to an OCI CLI config file.
oci.profile	DEFAULT	string	Specify which profile to use in the OCI CLI config file.
pager	None	string	Use the specified external pager tool to display text and results. Command-line arguments for the tool can be added (see Section 4.6, “Using a Pager”).
passwordsFromStdin	false	boolean	Read passwords from stdin instead of terminal.
resultFormat	table	string (table, tabbed, vertical, json | json/pretty, ndjson | json/raw, json/array)	The default output format for printing result sets (see Section 5.7, “Output Formats”).
sandboxDir	Depends on platform	string	The sandbox directory. On Windows, the default is C:\Users\MyUser\MySQL\mysql-sandboxes, and on Unix systems, the default is $HOME/mysql-sandboxes.
showColumnTypeInfo	false	boolean	In SQL mode, display column metadata for result sets.
showWarnings	true	boolean	In SQL mode, automatically display SQL warnings if any.
ssh.bufferSize	10240	integer greater than 0	The buffer size in bytes for data transfer through an SSH tunnel (see Section 4.3.7, “Using an SSH Tunnel”).
ssh.configFile	empty	string	The path to a custom SSH configuration file that replaces the standard SSH configuration file ~/.ssh/config as the default for SSH tunneling (see Section 4.3.7, “Using an SSH Tunnel”).
useWizards	true	boolean	(Read-only) Indicates if interactive prompting and wizards are enabled by default
verbose	0	integer ranging from 0 to 4	Enable verbose output to the console and set a level of detail (see Chapter 12, MySQL Shell Logging and Debug).

Note

String values are case-sensitive.

Options listed as “READ ONLY” cannot be modified.

The outputFormat option is now deprecated. Use resultFormat instead.

Using the \option Command

The MySQL Shell \option command enables you to query and change configuration options in all modes, enabling configuration from SQL mode in addition to JavaScript and Python modes.

The command is used as follows:

• \option -h, --help [filter] - print help for options matching filter.

• \option -l, --list [--show-origin] - list all the options. --show-origin augments the list with information about how the value was last changed, possible values are:

  • Command line

  • Compiled default

  • Configuration file

  • Environment variable

  • User defined

• \option option_name - print the current value of the option.

• \option [--persist] option_name value or name=value - set the value of the option and if --persist is specified save it to the configuration file.

• \option --unset [--persist] <option_name> - reset option's value to default and if --persist is specified, removes the option from the MySQL Shell configuration file.

Note

The value of option_name and filter are case-sensitive.

See Valid Configuration Options for a list of possible values for option_name.

Using the shell.options Configuration Interface

The shell.options object is available in JavaScript and Python mode to change MySQL Shell option values. You can use specific methods to configure the options, or key-value pairs as follows:

MySQL JS > shell.options['history.autoSave']=1

In addition to the key-value pair interface, the following methods are available:

• shell.options[optionName]: lists the current value of the option.

• shell.options.set(optionName, value): sets the optionName to value for this session, the change is not saved to the configuration file.

• shell.options.setPersist(optionName, value): sets the optionName to value for this session, and saves the change to the configuration file. In Python mode, the method is shell.options.set_persist.

• shell.options.unset(optionName): resets the optionName to the default value for this session, the change is not saved to the configuration file.

• shell.options.unsetPersist(optionName): resets the optionName to the default value for this session, and saves the change to the configuration file. In Python mode, the method is shell.options.unset_persist.

Option names are treated as strings, and as such should be surrounded by ' characters. See Valid Configuration Options for a list of possible values for optionName.

Use the commands to configure MySQL Shell options as follows:

MySQL JS > shell.options.set('history.maxSize', 5000)
MySQL JS > shell.options.setPersist('useWizards', 'true')
MySQL JS > shell.options.setPersist('history.autoSave', 1)

Return options to their default values as follows:

MySQL JS > shell.options.unset('history.maxSize')
MySQL JS > shell.options.unsetPersist('useWizards')

Configuration File

The MySQL Shell configuration file stores the values of the option to ensure they are persisted across sessions. Values are read at startup and when you use the persist feature, settings are saved to the configuration file.

The location of the configuration file is the user configuration path and the file is named options.json. Assuming that the default user configuration path has not been overridden by defining the environment variable MYSQLSH_USER_CONFIG_HOME, the path to the configuration file is:

• on Windows %APPDATA%\MySQL\mysqlsh

• on Unix ~/.mysqlsh where ~ represents the user's home directory.

The configuration file is created the first time you customize a configuration option. This file is internally maintained by MySQL Shell and should not be edited manually. If an unrecognized option or an option with an incorrect value is found in the configuration file on startup, MySQL Shell exits with an error.