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 The Information Schema - MySQL 8 Query Performance Tuning: A Systematic Method for Improving Execution Speeds

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6. The sys Schema 8. SHOW Statements
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© Jesper Wisborg Krogh 2020

J. W. Krogh, MySQL 8 Query Performance Tuning
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-5584-1_7

7. The Information
Schema
1  
Jesper Wisborg Krogh

(1) Hornsby, NSW, Australia

 

When you need to optimize a query, it is common that you need information
about the schema, indexes, and the like. In that case, the Information Schema
is a good resource of data. This chapter introduces the Information Schema
together with an overview of the views it contains. The Information Schema
is used on several occasions in the rest of the book.

What Is the Information

Schema?
The Information Schema is a schema common to several of the relational
databases including MySQL where it was added in MySQL 5.0. MySQL mostly
follows the SQL:2003 standard for F021 Basic information schema with the
changes necessary to reflect the unique features of MySQL and with
additional views that are not part of the standard.

Note The Information Schema is virtual in the sense that no data is

stored in it. For this reason, this chapter refers to all views and tables as
views even if a SHOW CREATE TABLE displays it as if it was a regular
table. This is also in line with the information_schema.TABLES view
that has the table type set to SYSTEM VIEW for all the objects.

After the introduction of the Performance Schema in MySQL 5.5, the aim is to
make relatively static data such as schema information available through the
Information Schema and more volatile data belonging to the Performance
Schema. That said, it is not always clear-cut what belongs where, for
example, index statistics are relatively volatile, but are also part of the
schema information. There is also some information such as the InnoDB
metrics that for historical reasons still reside in the Information Schema.

As such, you can consider the Information Schema a collection of data

describing the MySQL instance. In MySQL 8 with the relational data
dictionary, several of the views are simple SQL views on the underlying data
dictionary tables. This means that the performance of many Information
Schema queries in MySQL 8 will be vastly superior to what you may have
experienced in older versions. This is particularly the case when querying
schema data that does not require retrieving information from the storage
engine.

Caution If you are still using MySQL 5.7 or earlier, be careful with
queries against views such as the TABLES and COLUMNS views in the
Information Schema. They can take a long time if the tables they contain
data for are not yet in the table definition cache or if the cache is not large
enough to hold all tables. An example of the performance difference of
the Information Schema between MySQL 5.7 and 8 is discussed in a blog
by the MySQL Server team: https://mysqlserverteam.com/mysql-
8-0-scaling-and-performance-of-information_schema/.

Privileges
The Information Schema is a virtual database, and the access to the views
works a little different from other tables. All users will see that the
information_schema schema exists, and they will see all views. However,
the result of querying the views depends on the privileges assigned to the
account. For example, an account that has no other privileges than the global
USAGE privilege will only see the Information Schema views when querying
the information_schema.TABLES view.

Some views require additional privileges in which case an

ER_SPECIFIC_ACCESS_DENIED_ERROR (error number 1227) error is
returned with a description of which privilege is missing. For example, the
INNODB_METRICS view requires the PROCESS privilege, so if a user without
the PROCESS privilege queries that view, the following error occurs:

mysql> SELECT *
         FROM information_schema.INNODB_METRICS;
ERROR: 1227: Access denied; you need (at least one of)
the PROCESS privilege(s) for this operation

Now, it is time to look at what kind of information you can find in the
Information Schema views.

Views
The data that is available in the Information Schema ranges from high-level
information about the system to low-level InnoDB metrics. This section
provides an overview of the views but will not go into detail as the most
important of the views from a performance tuning perspective are discussed
in the relevant parts of later chapters.
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Note Some plugins add their own views to the Information Schema.
The extra plugin views are not considered here.

SYSTEM INFORMATION
The highest level of information that is available in the Information Schema
concerns the whole MySQL instance. This includes such information as
which character sets are available and which plugins are installed.

The views with system information are summarized in Table 7-1.

Table 7-1 Information Schema views with system information

View Name Descriptio

The charact
CHARACTER_SETS
sets availab

The collatio
available fo
each charac
set. This
includes the
of the
collation
which in so
COLLATIONS
cases (e.g., i
the binary l
is used to
uniquely
specify both
the collation
and charact
set.

The mappin
of collation
character se
COLLATION_CHARACTER_SET_APPLICABILITY (the same a
the first two
columns of
COLLATION

The storage
engines tha
ENGINES are known a
whether the
are loaded.

A list of the
default
stopwords
that are use
INNODB_FT_DEFAULT_STOPWORD
when creati
a full text
index on an
InnoDB tab

A list of the
keywords in
MySQL and
KEYWORDS
whether the
keyword is
reserved.

The plugins
known to
PLUGINS MySQL
including th
status.

The resourc
groups that
are used by
threads to d
their work.
resource
RESOURCE_GROUPS
group
specifies th
priority of a
thread and
which CPUs
can use.

A list of the
spatial
reference
systems
including th
SRS_ID
ST_SPATIAL_REFERENCE_SYSTEMS column whi
contains the
used to spe
a reference
system for
spatial
columns.

The system-related views largely work as reference views with the

RESOURCE_GROUPS table being somewhat a difference as it is possible to
add resource groups as it will be discussed in Chapter 17.

The KEYWORDS view is, for example, useful when testing an upgrade as you
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it to verify whether any of your schema, table, column, routine, or

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parameter names matches a keyword in the new version. If that is the case,
you will need to update the application to quote the identifier, if that is not
already the case. To find all column names matching a keyword:

SELECT TABLE_SCHEMA, TABLE_NAME,

       COLUMN_NAME, RESERVED
  FROM information_schema.COLUMNS
       INNER JOIN information_schema.KEYWORDS
          ON KEYWORDS.WORD = COLUMNS.COLUMN_NAME
 WHERE TABLE_SCHEMA NOT IN ('mysql',
                            'information_schema',
                            'performance_schema',
                            'sys'
                           )
 ORDER BY TABLE_SCHEMA, TABLE_NAME, COLUMN_NAME;

The query uses the COLUMNS view to find all column names except for the
system schemas (you can choose to include those, if you use those in your
application or in scripts). The COLUMNS view is one of several views
describing the schema objects.

SCHEMA INFORMATION
The views with information about the schema objects are among the most
useful views in the Information Schema. These are also the source for several
of the SHOW statements . You can use the views to find information from
everything from parameters for a stored routine to database names. The
views with schema information are summarized in Table 7-2.

Table 7-2 Information Schema views with schema information

View Name Description

This view contains

information about the
CHECK_CONSTRAINTS CHECK constraints and is
available in MySQL
8.0.16 and later.

The definition of
histograms including the
COLUMN_STATISTICS statistics. This is a very
useful view for query
performance tuning.

COLUMNS The column definitions.

The definitions of the

EVENTS
stored events.

Information about
FILES
InnoDB tablespace files.

Metadata information for

INNODB_COLUMNS columns in InnoDB
tables.

This view links the

INNODB_DATAFILES InnoDB tablespace ids to
the file system paths.

Metadata for columns

INNODB_FIELDS included in InnoDB
indexes.

Metadata for the InnoDB

INNODB_FOREIGN
foreign keys.

Lists the child and parent

INNODB_FOREIGN_COLS columns of InnoDB
foreign keys.

A snapshot of the
INNODB_FT_DELETED
view during an
OPTIMIZE TABLE
INNODB_FT_BEING_DELETED
statement for the InnoDB
table specified in the
innodb_ft_aux_table
option .

Configuration
information for full text
indexes on the InnoDB
INNODB_FT_CONFIG
table specified in the
innodb_ft_aux_table
option.

Rows that have been

deleted from full text
indexes for the InnoDB
table specified in the
innodb_ft_aux_table
INNODB_FT_DELETED option. InnoDB uses this
extra list for
performance reasons to
avoid having to update
the index itself for each
DML statement.
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View Name Description

Newly inserted rows into

the full text indexes for
the InnoDB table
specified in the
innodb_ft_aux_table
INNODB_FT_INDEX_CACHE option. InnoDB uses this
extra list for
performance reasons to
avoid having to update
the index itself for each
DML statement.

The inverted full text

index for the InnoDB
INNODB_FT_INDEX_TABLE table specified in the
innodb_ft_aux_table
option.

Information about
indexes on InnoDB
tables. This includes
INNODB_INDEXES internal information
such as the page number
of the root page and the
merge threshold.

Metadata for the InnoDB

INNODB_TABLES
tables.

Metadata for the InnoDB

INNODB_TABLESPACES
tablespaces.

This view combines the

SPACE, NAME, FLAG, and
SPACE_TYPE columns
from
INNODB_TABLESPACES
INNODB_TABLESPACES_BRIEF
with the PATH column
from
INNODB_DATAFILES to
provide a summary of
the InnoDB tablespace.

Table statistics for

InnoDB tables. Some of
these statistics are
INNODB_TABLESTATS updated at the same time
as index statistics; others
are maintained at an
ongoing basis.

Metadata for InnoDB

INNODB_TEMP_TABLE_INFO temporary tables (both
internal and explicit).

Internal metadata
information about virtual
INNODB_VIRTUAL
generated columns on
InnoDB tables.

Information about the

KEY_COLUMN_USAGE primary keys, unique
keys, and foreign keys.

Information about the

parameters for stored
PARAMETERS
functions and stored
procedures.

Information about table

PARTITIONS
partitions.

Information about
REFERENTIAL_CONSTRAINTS
foreign keys.

The definition of stored

ROUTINES functions and stored
procedures.

Information about the

schemas (databases).
(Schemata is technically
SCHEMATA the correct word for the
plural form of schema,
but most use schemas
nowadays.)

Information about
ST_GEOMETRY_COLUMNS columns with a spatial
data type.

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View Name Description

The index definitions and

statistics. This is one of
STATISTICS the most useful views
when it comes to query
performance turning.

Summary of the primary,

TABLE_CONSTRAINTS unique, and foreign keys
and CHECK constraints.

Information about tables

TABLES and views and their
properties.

This view is only used for

TABLESPACES
NDB Cluster tablespaces.

TRIGGERS The trigger definitions.

Lists the stored functions

VIEW_ROUTINE_USAGE used in views. This table
was added in 8.0.13.

Lists the tables

referenced by views. This
VIEW_TABLE_USAGE
view was added in
8.0.13.

VIEWS The view definitions.

Several of the views are closely related, for example, the columns are in
tables which are in schemas and constraints refer to tables and columns.
This means that some of the column names are present in several of the
views. The most commonly used column names that relate to these views
are

TABLE_NAME: Used in the views not specific to InnoDB for the table name.

TABLE_SCHEMA: Used in the views not specific to InnoDB for the schema
name.

COLUMN_NAME: Used in the views not specific to InnoDB for the column
name.

SPACE: Used in the InnoDB-specific views for the tablespace id.

TABLE_ID: Used in the InnoDB-specific views to uniquely identify the

table. This is also used internally in InnoDB.

NAME: The InnoDB-specific views use a column called NAME to give the
name of the object irrespective of the object type.

In addition to the use of the names as in this list, there are also examples
where these column names are slightly modified like in the view
KEY_COLUMN_USAGE where you find the columns
REFERENCED_TABLE_SCHEMA, REFERENCED_TABLE_NAME, and
REFERENCED_COLUMN_NAME that are used in the description of foreign
keys. As an example, if you want to use the KEY_COLUMN_USAGE view to
find the tables with foreign keys referencing the sakila.film table, you can use
a query like this:

mysql> SELECT TABLE_SCHEMA, TABLE_NAME

    FROM information_schema.KEY_COLUMN_USAGE

    WHERE REFERENCED_TABLE_SCHEMA = 'sakila'

        AND REFERENCED_TABLE_NAME = 'film';
+--------------+---------------+
| TABLE_SCHEMA | TABLE_NAME    |
+--------------+---------------+
| sakila       | film_actor    |
| sakila       | film_category |
| sakila       | inventory     |
+--------------+---------------+
3 rows in set (0.0078 sec)

This shows that the film_actor, film_category, and inventory tables all have
foreign keys where the film table is the parent table. For example, if you look
at the table definition for film_actor:

mysql> SHOW CREATE TABLE sakila.film_actor\G

*************************** 1. row
***************************
       Table: film_actor
Create Table: CREATE TABLE `film_actor` (
  `actor_id` smallint(5) unsigned NOT NULL,
  `film_id` smallint(5) unsigned NOT NULL,
  `last_update` timestamp NOT NULL DEFAULT
CURRENT_TIMESTAMP ON UPDATE CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
  PRIMARY KEY (`actor_id`,`film_id`),
  KEY `idx_fk_film_id` (`film_id`),
  CONSTRAINT `fk_film_actor_actor` FOREIGN KEY
(`actor_id`) REFERENCES `actor` (`actor_id`) ON DELETE
RESTRICT ON UPDATE CASCADE,
  CONSTRAINT `fk_film_actor_film` FOREIGN KEY
(`film_id`) REFERENCES `film` (`film_id`) ON DELETE
RESTRICT ON UPDATE CASCADE
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8
1 row in set (0.0097 sec)

The fk_film_actor_film constraint references the film_id column in

the film table. You can use this as the starting point for finding the full chain
of foreign keys either by manually executing the query for each table
returned in the query against the KEY_COLUMN_USAGE view or by creating a
recursive common table expression (CTE). This is left as an exercise for the
reader.

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Tip For an example where the KEY_COLUMN_USAGE view is used in a

recursive common table expression to find the chain of foreign key
dependencies, see https://mysql.wisborg.dk/tracking-
foreign-keys.

For completeness, a visual representation of the tables depending on the

film table through foreign keys can be found in Figure 7-1.

Figure 7-1 A visual representation of the foreign key chain from

sakila.film

The diagram is created using the reverse engineering feature of MySQL

Workbench.

The views with information specific to InnoDB use the SPACE and
TABLE_ID to identify the tablespace and table. Each tablespace has a unique
id with ranges reserved for different tablespace types. For example, the data
dictionary tablespace file (<datadir>/mysql.ibd) has space id
4294967294, the temporary tablespace has id 4294967293, undo log
tablespaces start with 4294967279 and decrement, and user tablespaces
start at 1.

The views with information about InnoDB full text indexes are special as
they require you to set the innodb_ft_aux_table global variable with the
name of the table you want to get information for. For example, to get the full
text index configuration of the sakila.film_text table :

mysql> SET GLOBAL innodb_ft_aux_table =

'sakila/film_text';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.0685 sec)

mysql> SELECT *
         FROM information_schema.INNODB_FT_CONFIG;
+---------------------------+-------+
| KEY                       | VALUE |
+---------------------------+-------+
| optimize_checkpoint_limit | 180   |
| synced_doc_id             | 1002  |
| stopword_table_name       |       |
| use_stopword              | 1     |
+---------------------------+-------+
4 rows in set (0.0009 sec)

The values in the INNODB_FT_CONFIG view may differ for you.

InnoDB also includes views with information that relates to performance.

These will be discussed together with a few other performance-related
tables.

PERFORMANCE INFORMATION
The group of views that relate to performance are those that you will likely
use the most in your performance tuning work together with the
COLUMN_STATISTICS and STATISTICS views from the previous group of
views. The views with performance-related information are listed in Table 7-
3.

Table 7-3 Information Schema views with performance-related information

View Name Description

A list of the
pages in the
InnoDB buffer
pool which can
be used to
determine
which tables
and indexes
are currently
cached.

INNODB_BUFFER_PAGE Warning:
There is a high
overhead of
querying this
table
particularly for
large buffer
pools and
many tables
and indexes. It
is best used on
test systems.

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View Name Description

Information
about the
pages in the
InnoDB buffer
pool and how
they are
ordered in the
least recently
used (LRU) list.

Warning:
INNODB_BUFFER_PAGE_LRU
There is a high
overhead of
querying this
table
particularly for
large buffer
pools and
many tables
and indexes. It
is best used on
test systems.

Statistics about
the usage of
the InnoDB
buffer pool.
The
information is
similar to what
can be found in
the SHOW

INNODB_BUFFER_POOL_STATS ENGINE
INNODB
STATUS output
in the BUFFER
POOL AND
MEMORY
section. This is
one of the
most useful
views.

A summary of
the number of
index pages
INNODB_CACHED_INDEXES cached in the
InnoDB buffer
pool for each
index.

Statistics about
INNODB_CMP operations
related to
INNODB_CMP_RESET compressed
InnoDB tables.

The same as
INNODB_CMP_PER_INDEX
INNODB_CMP
but grouped by
INNODB_CMP_PER_INDEX_RESET
the index.

Statistics about
INNODB_CMPMEM compressed
pages in the
INNODB_CMPMEM_RESET InnoDB buffer
pool.

Similar to the
global status
INNODB_METRICS variables but
specific to
InnoDB.

Metadata
including the
connection id,
file path, and
size for InnoDB
temporary
tablespace files
(each session
gets its own
file in MySQL
8.0.13 and
INNODB_SESSION_TEMP_TABLESPACES
later). It can be
used to link a
session to a
tablespace file
which is very
useful if you
notice one file
becoming
large. The view
was added in
8.0.13.

Information
INNODB_TRX about InnoDB
transactions.

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View Name Description

When the
optimizer trace
is enabled, the
OPTIMIZER_TRACE
trace can be
queried from
this view.

The same as
PROCESSLIST SHOW
PROCESSLIST.

When profiling
is enabled, the
profiling
statistics can
be queried
from this view.
This is
PROFILING
deprecated,
and it is
recommended
to use the
Performance
Schema
instead.

For the views with information about InnoDB compressed tables, the table
with _RESET as the suffix returns the operation and timing statistics as
deltas since the last time the view was queried.

The INNODB_METRICS view includes metrics similar to the global status

variables but specific to InnoDB. The metrics are grouped into subsystems
(the SUBSYSTEM column), and for each metric there is a description of what
the metric measures in the COMMENT column. You can enable, disable, and
reset the metrics using global system variables:

innodb_monitor_disable: Disable one or more metrics.

innodb_monitor_enable: Enable one or more metrics.

innodb_monitor_reset: Reset the counter for one or more metrics.

innodb_monitor_reset_all: Reset all statistics including the counter,

minimum, and maximum values for one or more metrics.

The metrics can be turned on and off as needed with the current status
found in the STATUS column. You specify the name of the metric as the value
to the innodb_monitor_enable or innodb_monitor_disable variable,
and you can use % as a wildcard. The value all works as a special value to
affect all metrics. Listing 7-1 shows an example of enabling and using all the
metrics matching %cpu% (which happens to be the metrics in the cpu
subsystem). The counter values depend on the workload you have at the
time of the query.

mysql> SET GLOBAL innodb_monitor_enable = '%cpu%';

Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.0005 sec)

mysql> SELECT NAME, COUNT, MIN_COUNT,

              MAX_COUNT, AVG_COUNT,
              STATUS, COMMENT
         FROM information_schema.INNODB_METRICS
        WHERE NAME LIKE '%cpu%'\G
*************************** 1. row
***************************
     NAME: module_cpu
    COUNT: 0
MIN_COUNT: NULL
MAX_COUNT: NULL
AVG_COUNT: 0
   STATUS: enabled
  COMMENT: CPU counters reflecting current usage of
CPU
*************************** 2. row
***************************
     NAME: cpu_utime_abs
    COUNT: 51
MIN_COUNT: 0
MAX_COUNT: 51
AVG_COUNT: 0.4358974358974359
   STATUS: enabled
  COMMENT: Total CPU user time spent
*************************** 3. row
***************************
     NAME: cpu_stime_abs
    COUNT: 7
MIN_COUNT: 0
MAX_COUNT: 7
AVG_COUNT: 0.05982905982905983
   STATUS: enabled
  COMMENT: Total CPU system time spent
*************************** 4. row
***************************
     NAME: cpu_utime_pct
    COUNT: 6
MIN_COUNT: 0
MAX_COUNT: 6
AVG_COUNT: 0.05128205128205128
   STATUS: enabled
  COMMENT: Relative CPU user time spent
*************************** 5. row
***************************
     NAME: cpu_stime_pct
    COUNT: 0
MIN_COUNT: 0
MAX_COUNT: 0
AVG_COUNT: 0
   STATUS: enabled
  COMMENT: Relative CPU system time spent
*************************** 6. row
***************************
     NAME: cpu_n
    COUNT: 8
MIN_COUNT: 8
MAX_COUNT: 8
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0.06837606837606838

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   STATUS: enabled
  COMMENT: Number of cpus
6 rows in set (0.0011 sec)
mysql> SET GLOBAL innodb_monitor_disable = '%cpu%';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.0004 sec)

Listing 7-1 Using the INNODB_METRICS view

First, the metrics are enabled using the innodb_monitor_enable variable;

then the values are retrieved. In addition to the values shown, there is also a
set of columns with the _RESET suffix which are reset when you set the
innodb_monitor_reset (only the counter) or
innodb_monitor_reset_all system variable. Finally, the metrics are
disabled again.

Caution The metrics have varying overheads, so you are recommended

to test with your workload before enabling metrics in production.

The InnoDB metrics are also included in the sys.metrics view together
with the global status variables and a few other metrics and when the
metrics are retrieved.

The remaining Information Schema views contain information about

privileges.

PRIVILEGE INFORMATION
MySQL uses privileges assigned to the accounts to determine which accounts
can access which schemas, tables, and columns. The common way to
determine the privileges for a given account is to use the SHOW GRANTS
statement, but the Information Schema also includes views that allow you to
query the privileges.

The Information Schema privilege views are summarized in Table 7-4. The
views are ordered from global privileges to column privileges.

Table 7-4 Information Schema tables with privilege information

Table Name Description

USER_PRIVILEGES The global privileges.

SCHEMA_PRIVILEGES Privileges to access schemas.

TABLE_PRIVILEGES Privileges to access tables.

COLUMN_PRIVILEGES Privileges to access columns.

In all views, the account is called GRANTEE and is in the form

'username'@'hostname' with the quotes always present. Listing 7-2
shows an example of retrieving the privileges for the
mysql.sys@localhost account and comparing it to the output of the
SHOW GRANTS statement.

mysql> SHOW GRANTS FOR 'mysql.sys'@'localhost'\G

*************************** 1. row
***************************
Grants for mysql.sys@localhost: GRANT USAGE ON *.* TO
`mysql.sys`@`localhost`
*************************** 2. row
***************************
Grants for mysql.sys@localhost: GRANT TRIGGER ON
`sys`.* TO `mysql.sys`@`localhost`
*************************** 3. row
***************************
Grants for mysql.sys@localhost: GRANT SELECT ON
`sys`.`sys_config` TO `mysql.sys`@`localhost`
3 rows in set (0.2837 sec)

mysql> SELECT *
         FROM information_schema.USER_PRIVILEGES
        WHERE GRANTEE =
'''mysql.sys''@''localhost'''\G
*************************** 1. row
***************************
       GRANTEE: 'mysql.sys'@'localhost'
 TABLE_CATALOG: def
PRIVILEGE_TYPE: USAGE
  IS_GRANTABLE: NO
1 row in set (0.0006 sec)

mysql> SELECT *
         FROM information_schema.SCHEMA_PRIVILEGES
        WHERE GRANTEE =
'''mysql.sys''@''localhost'''\G
*************************** 1. row
***************************
       GRANTEE: 'mysql.sys'@'localhost'
 TABLE_CATALOG: def
  TABLE_SCHEMA: sys
PRIVILEGE_TYPE: TRIGGER
  IS_GRANTABLE: NO
1 row in set (0.0005 sec)

mysql> SELECT *
         FROM information_schema.TABLE_PRIVILEGES
        WHERE GRANTEE =
'''mysql.sys''@''localhost'''\G
*************************** 1. row
***************************
       GRANTEE: 'mysql.sys'@'localhost'
 TABLE_CATALOG: def
  TABLE_SCHEMA: sys
    TABLE_NAME: sys_config
PRIVILEGE_TYPE: SELECT
  IS_GRANTABLE: NO
1 row in set (0.0005 sec)

mysql> SELECT *
         FROM information_schema.COLUMN_PRIVILEGES
        WHERE GRANTEE =
'''mysql.sys''@''localhost'''\G
Empty set (0.0005 sec)

Listing 7-2 Using the Information Schema privilege views

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Notice how the single quotes around the username and hostname are
escaped by doubling the quotes.

While the views with the privilege information are not directly usable for
performance tuning, they are very useful for maintaining a stable system as
you can use them to easily identify whether any accounts have privileges
that they do not need.

Tip It is best practice to limit accounts to have just the privileges they
need and no more. That is one of the steps to keep the system secure.

The last topic to consider about the Information Schema is how data related
to index statistics are cached.

Caching of Index Statistics

Data
One thing that is important to understand is where the information in the
index statistics–related views (and the equivalent SHOW statements) comes
from. Most of the data comes from the MySQL data dictionary. In MySQL 8,
the data dictionary is stored in an InnoDB table, so the views are just normal
SQL views on top of the data dictionary. (You can, for example, try to execute
SHOW CREATE VIEW information_schema.STATISTICS to get the
definition of the STATISTICS view.)

The index statistics themselves are however still originating from the storage
engine layer, so it is relatively expensive to query those. To improve the
performance, the statistics are cached in the data dictionary. You can control
how old the statistics are allowed to be before MySQL refreshes the cache.
This is done with the information_schema_stats_expiry variable
which defaults to 86400 seconds (one day). If you set the value to 0, you will
always get the latest values available from the storage engine; this is the
equivalent of the MySQL 5.7 behavior. The variable can be set both at the
global and session scopes, so you can set it to 0 for the session, if you are
investigating an issue where it is important to see the current statistics, for
example, if the optimizer is not using the index you expect.

Tip Use the information_schema_stats_expiry variable to

control how long index statistics can be cached in the data dictionary.
This is only for displaying purposes – the optimizer always uses the latest
statistics. Setting information_schema_stats_expiry to 0 to disable
caching can, for example, be useful when investigating an issue with the
wrong index being used by the optimizer. You can change the value both
at the global and session scopes as needed.

The caching affects the columns listed in Table 7-5. The SHOW statements
displaying the same data are also affected.

Table 7-5 Columns affected by information_schema_stats_expiry

View Name Column Name Description

The estimate
for the number
of unique
values for the
STATISTICS CARDINALITY part of the
index up and
including to the
column in the
same row.

TABLES The next value

for the auto-
AUTO_INCREMENT increment
counter for the
table.

The estimated
data length
divided with
AVG_ROW_LENGTH
the estimated
number of
rows.

The table
checksum. It is
CHECKSUM not used by
InnoDB, so the
value is NULL.

When the table

was last
checked
(CHECK
CHECK_TIME TABLE). For
partitioned
tables, InnoDB
always returns
NULL.

When the table

CREATE_TIME
was created.

An estimate of
the amount of
free space in
the tablespace
the table
DATA_FREE belongs to. For
InnoDB, this is
the size of
completely free
extents minus a
safety margin.

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View Name Column Name Description

The estimated
size of the row
data. For
InnoDB, it is the
size of the
clustered index,
DATA_LENGTH
which is found
as the number
of pages in the
clustered index
multiplied with
the page size.

The estimated
size of
secondary
indexes. For
InnoDB, this is
INDEX_LENGTH
the sum of
pages in non-
clustered
indexes times
the page size.

The maximum
allowed size of
the data length.
MAX_DATA_LENGTH
It is not used by
InnoDB, so the
value is NULL.

The estimated
number of
rows. For
InnoDB tables,
TABLE_ROWS this comes from
the cardinality
of the primary
key or clustered
index.

When the
tablespace file
was last
updated. For
tables in the
InnoDB system
tablespace, the
value is NULL.
As data is
UPDATE_TIME written to the
tablespace
asynchronously,
the time will
not in general
reflect the time
of the last
statement
changing the
data.

You can force an update of this data for a given table by executing ANALYZE
TABLE for the table.

There are times when querying the data does not update the cached data:

When the cached data has not yet expired, that is, it was refreshed less
than information_schema_stats_expiry seconds ago

When information_schema_stats_expiry is set to 0

When MySQL or InnoDB is running in a read-only mode, that is, when one
of the modes, read_only, super_read_only,
transaction_read_only, or innodb_read_only, is enabled.

When the query also includes data from the Performance Schema

Summary
This chapter introduced the Information Schema by first discussing what the
Information Schema is and how the user privileges work. The remainder of
the chapter walked through the standard views and how caching works. The
Information Schema views can be grouped by the type of information they
contain: system, schema, performance, and privilege information.

The system information includes the character sets and collations, resource
groups, keywords, and information related to spatial data. This is useful as
an alternative to using the reference manual.

The schema information is the largest group of views and includes all the
information available from schema data down to columns, indexes, and
constraints. These views together with the performance views that have
information such as metrics and InnoDB buffer pool statistics are the most
commonly used views in performance tuning. The privilege-related views
are not so often used for performance tuning, but they are very useful to help
maintain a stable system.

A common shortcut to obtain information from the Information Schema

views is to use a SHOW statement . These will be discussed in the next
chapter.

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