Pull the MySQL image

Pull the latest MySQL image from Docker Hub. In your terminal, run docker pull mysql to pull the latest MySQL version from Docker Hub:

docker pull mysql

Alternatively, you can pull preferred version with a specific tag:

docker pull mysql:8.2

When MySQL image is downloaded, you can check it in Images tab in Docker Desktop or by running docker images:

docker images

REPOSITORY   TAG       IMAGE ID       CREATED        SIZE
mysql        latest    4e8a34aea708   2 months ago   609MB

Start a MySQL instance

To start a new MySQL container, run the following command:

docker run --name drizzle-mysql -e MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=mypassword -d -p 3306:3306 mysql

1. The --name option assigns the container the name drizzle-mysql.
2. The -e MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD= option sets the MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD environment variable with the specified value. This is password for the root user.
3. The -d flag runs the container in detached mode (in the background).
4. The -p option maps port 3306 on the container to port 3306 on your host machine, allowing MySQL to be accessed from your host system through this port.
5. The mysql argument specifies the image to use for the container. You can also specify other versions like mysql:8.2.

You can also specify other parameters like:

1. -e MYSQL_DATABASE= to create a new database when the container is created. Default is mysql.
2. -e MYSQL_USER= and -e MYSQL_PASSWORD= to create a new user with a password when the container is created. But you still need to specify MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD for root user.

To check if the container is running, check Containers tab in Docker Desktop or use the docker ps command:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE         COMMAND                  CREATED          STATUS          PORTS                               NAMES
19506a8dc12b   mysql         "docker-entrypoint.s…"   4 seconds ago    Up 3 seconds    33060/tcp, 0.0.0.0:3306->3306/tcp   drizzle-mysql

Configure database url

To connect to the MySQL database, you need to provide the database URL. The URL format is:

mysql://<user>:<password>@<host>:<port>/<database>

You should replace placeholders with your actual values. For example, for created container the url will be:

mysql://root:mypassword@localhost:3306/mysql

Now you can connect to the database using the URL in your application.