How Do I Convert ISAM Tables to MyISAM Tables?

[chinmay.sahoo]

If you've been using MySQL since before version 3.23, chances are that any preexisting tables are of the ISAM storage engine type. If this is the case, you should convert all such tables to the MyISAM type. Surprisingly, doing so is quite trivial, accomplished with a single ALTER command for each table:

ALTER TABLE table_name TYPE=MYISAM;

Alternatively, you can use the mysql_convert_table_format utility, which is bundled with the MySQL server. This client works much like mysql or mysqladmin, requiring authorization before any commands are executed. As an example, suppose you want to convert all ISAM tables located in a legacy database named clients to MyISAM:

%>mysql_convert_table_format -u root -p --type='MYISAM' clients

You can also specifically enumerate the tables that you'd like to convert. For example, suppose that there only two tables that require conversion (namely, companies and staff) in the clients database:

%>mysql_convert_table_format -u root -p --type='MYISAM' clients companies staff

Note : that this script is capable of converting between BDB, ISAM, and MyISAM tables.