Create a database using PHP or phpMyAdmin [closed] - php

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I'm new to web development, and for the college thesis I'm going to create an online system that uses a database. My question is: how should one create a database?
a) Using PHP such as:
<?php
$servername = "host_name";
$username = "user_name";
$password = "password";
$dbname = "dbname";
$link = connectToMySql($servername, $username, $password) or die( " Unable to connect to server ");
$query = "CREATE DATABASE IF NOT EXISTS $dbname";
if (executeSQLQuery($query))
{
echo "Database <b>$dbname</b> created successfully <br />";
}
else
{
echo "Error in creating database: <br/><br/>". launchError();
}
?>
b) Or using phpMyAdmin (creating manually database and tables)?
Which approach is the best? Which one should be used and why (Advantages, disadvantages)?

Answer 1

For a thesis, it hardly matters.
For normal development, if you are the only user of your software, then it is probably easiest to maintain it in a maintenance tool like PHPMyAdmin, because you can create and update it in a very visual way.
Creating it in software is especially useful as an installation feature. Some common software, like Wordpress and MediaWiki create their own database and even have smart scripts that update the database structure when a new version has additional requirements. But building something like that is also tricky and time-consuming, so unless you want to have such an installer feature, it is probably not worth the effort.
Also note, that for proper database management, you'll want to have different users with different rights. You may want to make your software connect using database credentials that only have rights to edit data (not structure), and only connect using a more powerful user if you have to update the database structure. But that probably also doesn't apply for a thesis, unless it is specifically about access control management.