If there is any project I'd be tempted to be snarky about, it's PhpMyAdmin (although last time I used it, it was 2006). From an administration perspective, it was often a hassle, especially in its beginnings. It is a very successful tool and for a while had the same reputation as wordpress: being a pretty remote shell.<p>But what PhpMyAdmin illustrates very well is how important tools can be to environments/communities. For a while, the presence of PhpMyAdmin was what gave PHP an edge over many other environments: here's a tool that gives you (and tech-savvy people in your company) insight into your database, allows you to do changes and some bit of backup visually instead of fighting with the command line. And, if you develop on PHP, you don't even have to install anything additional on your platform. It made running PHP hosting without shell access feasable.
I too can hate on phpmyadmin and suggest superior alternatives. However, just let it sink in for one second how incredibly successful this tool has been, regardless of its detriments. Most of us would kill for this kind of household name recognition. It was at the right place at the right time, for sure, but I think there's probably something we can still learn from them.
I've been working on a PhpMyAdmin-like tool recently called Schema (<a href="http://github.com/timdavies/schema" rel="nofollow">http://github.com/timdavies/schema</a>). It's a single-page app (Node.JS/Backbone) and I've had quite a bit of positive feedback from people testing it - much faster than PhpMyAdmin, nicer UI, etc. There's a lot left to do on it (missing critical features at the moment such as inserting rows..) however I'm unable to work on it for roughly a month as I've taken a new job and need to learn some new stuff for it. If anyone wants to help out, you'd be more than welcome (will give commit access after a few pull requests) :-)
I prefer the extremely lightweight Adminer: <a href="http://www.adminer.org/en/" rel="nofollow">http://www.adminer.org/en/</a><p>It works great for MySQL, SQLite and can be used for some basic PostgreSQL work too.
I don't use PhpMyAdmin a lot, only when there is no other option available (I prefer SQLyog). But lately I got very frustrated by the interface changes.<p>Then I discovered the option to enable the old theme again. A great tool!
I'd appreciate it more if they'd just stop doing<p><pre><code> SELECT COUNT(*)
</code></pre>
on innodb tables (which do not handle that query well with many rows). Yes there is a workaround but it is flawed.
I think phpMyAdmin v4 is a backward move. They got rid of frames in favor of a more ajaxified UI but it is running many times slower than the <3.5 versions. I understand using Frames is supposed to be bad but in this case they offered a better user experience.
phpMyAdmin gets dumped on a lot but it was a big help for me when I was just learning to write my own queries. The way it shows you the query that powers each action you run is a great learning tool.
I use it a lot for local development, but wouldn't install it on a production server for security reasons. However, if you run commands in phpMyAdmin, it actually gives you the SQL code for your desired action, which you can then copy and paste to the command line on your production server.
The new AJAXified interface is slower and more inconsistent. The inline edit feature never works and has a very subtle feedback. But hey, it's ubiquitous and it gets the job done. However, I've started using SequelPro on OS X as a replacement which works pretty great.
It may be just me, but I personally would not mention the lines of code as a success story metric.<p>I feel like lots of line of code usually means bloat.<p>That aside, I often use phpMyAdmin and it is a great tool for those quick little edits! And if you know already about SQL then it is really easy to use.
I don't use PhpMyAdmin but my servers get hit regularly from vulnerability-bots looking for holes in phpmyadmin/*.php pages.<p>Are there a lot of known security issues outstanding?
PhpMyAdmin has been great. It's really one of the only reasons I was able to learn PHP + MySQL in high school. It's quick, simple, and convenient on Windows.
MySQL Workbench trumps the other tools for managing MySQL, but for quick web access I prefer Adminer. It's easier to set up, appears less cluttered and fast.
This is one of the (many) apps we looked at when we started working on JackDB[1]. It's a database client in your browser. Rather than just a table interface though, JackDB is a full featured query editor and even includes scrolling result sets.<p>Besides MySQL, we also support PostgreSQL (what we use in house), Oracle and MS SQL Server.<p>[1]: <a href="http://www.jackdb.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.jackdb.com/</a>
For Yii fans, there is a similar project called Chive [1].<p>[1] <a href="http://www.chive-project.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.chive-project.com/</a>
PhpMyAdmin has turned into an utter mess. I use - and most definitely rely on it - daily. But every version since 2.X has been a step back. The AJAX in the latest version is disastrous. Everything about it is slower than the older frame versions. Worse yet, even simple tasks such as renaming a table or column will cause it to go non-responsive.
I remember when you were only maybe 5 or 6 years old. I was maybe 21 and I used you to get a MySQL database in shape so that I could create a submission tool for programming contest. One of my first web apps! Congrats PHPMyAdmin on turning 15!
Wow.... 15 years! Working at a hosting provider way back when I would die a little inside every time someone asked me to install phpmyadmin for their databases.<p>I'm sure it's come a long way (at least I hope it has).
if any one is looking for lightweight alternatives, checkout SQL Buddy (<a href="http://sqlbuddy.com/" rel="nofollow">http://sqlbuddy.com/</a>) .
PhpMyAdmin has saved my butt many times with a bad joomla install or when I need to output sql. I mostly use navicat these days when I need to touch mysql.
phpmyadmin is not the best mysql frontend one can have but it is simple to install, easy to use and makes many things incredibly simple.<p>For example for my mobile backends, I use only phpmyadmin to populate the data and use rails scaffolds to provide json outout to the mobile clients.