SiteHost

Managing Databases

Before proceeding with any of the steps below, ensure that you have created a container for the MySQL or MariaDB version you want to create a database for. If you wish to view/manage your database through your browser, ensure that you have a PHPMyAdmin container as well.

Creating a Database

  1. When logged in to the Control Panel, click Containers in the left menu.
  2. Then click Databases below that to bring you to the databases module.
  3. Click Add Databases in the top right.
  4. Choose a name for your database.
  5. Select which database version you want to use.
  6. Select the Cloud Container server for the database to be created on.
  7. Choose the backup location. (This is where the database backups will reside inside the backup mounts).
  8. Click Add Database to start the creation process.

Viewing Database Data in The Browser

  1. When logged in to the Control Panel, click Containers in the left menu.
  2. Then click Databases below that to bring you to the databases sub module.
  3. Click the More Actions icon (•••) on the row of the database you would like to view.
  4. Click Database Admin in the dropdown menu.
  5. This will open a new tab with phpMyAdmin set up for your server.
  6. Enter your username and password and then click Go to open up your database.

Removing a Database

  1. When logged in to the Control Panel, click Containers in the left menu.
  2. Then click Databases below that to bring you to the databases sub module.
  3. Click the More Actions icon (•••) on the row of the database you would like to remove.
  4. Click Delete to bring up the confirmation modal.
  5. To confirm you wish to remove the database click Delete Database in the pop up modal.

Backing Up Your Database

When creating or updating a database you will be required to select a container to associate the database with. This specifies the location in which to backup the database to when a backup of your Cloud Container is performed. The backups for a database are stored within the backups directory for the corresponding container. For more information on where to find this, please refer to our article on cloud container backups.

Modifying the Backup Location

  1. When logged in to the Control Panel, click Containers in the left menu.
  2. Then click Databases below that to bring you to the databases sub module.
  3. Click the name of the database to bring up the database management screen.
  4. Use the selector underneath the "Backup Location" title to choose which container should house the database backup.
  5. Click Save Changes to update the backup location.

Supported Storage Engines

While we still offer limited support for the MyISAM storage engine, this is being phased out in favour of InnoDB. This choice is largely due to support of MyISAM being slowly removed in MySQL, with a very limited options available for its use in MySQL 8.

If you have have databases which make use of MyISAM for some or all of their tables you will notice certain functions in the SiteHost Control Panel will not behave as expected, such as the displayed database size.

You can view the storage engine your tables are using from the browser. The overview will give you details of which storage engine each table is using, as well as summarising the total disk space of the database.

If you find you are using MyISAM, we highly recommend updating your databases to use InnoDB as this has proven to be more stable and improve performance.

  1. Open up your database in the browser.
  2. Select the table you want to alter.
  3. Select "Operations" from the top navigation menu.
  4. Under "Table Options" select "InnoDB" from the "Storage Engine" drop down.
  5. Click "go" to the bottom left of this section.