How to backup mysql databases (mysqlhotcopy, mysqldump)

Last modified on July 24, 2026 • 1 min read • 139 words There are different possibilities. If you have access to the machine where mysql is running, you should use:mysqlhotcopy On our RedHat 8 server you just type:/usr/bin/mysqlhotcopy --user=root --password=sdjksjd journal /path/to/backup/directory Alternatively:/usr/local/mysql/bin/mysqldump --user=username -p phpgedview >phpgedview The path of the command is specific for the mysql install on a MacOS X machine.If you want to back up from another machine you can use the mysqldump command: mysqldump --host=hostname_or_ipaddress --user=username -p phpgedview >phpgedview This example backs up the database phpgedview which is on the machine hostname_or_ipaddress.The actual database files are in subdirectories in /var/lib/mysql in case you don’t remember their names.To automatically backup a database via the network you can put a file with the following content to the /etc/cron.hourly directory:!/bin/sh mysqldump --host=hostname_or_ipaddress --user=USER -pPASSWORD journal >mysqldump_journal This would create every hour a fresh backupfile called mysqldump_journal in the /etc/cron.hourly directory.