The syntax for creating a table is as follows:
CREATE TABLE (
field1 datatype,
field2 datatype,
etc......
);
When splitting over multiple lines within the MySQL command line the continuation indictor(-) will be used.
mysql> CREATE TABLE (
-> field1 datatype,
-> field2 datatype,
-> etc......);
The command statement will not be executed until you use a semi-colon.
mysql>
mysql> CREATE TABLE employee (
-> ID INT(2) auto_increment primary key,
-> First_name VARCHAR(20),
-> Last_name VARCHAR(30),
-> Start_date DATE,
-> Salary int(6),
-> city VARCHAR(20),
-> description VARCHAR(20)
-> );
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.03 sec)
mysql>
mysql> desc employee;
+-------------+-------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| Field | Type | Null | Key | Default | Extra |
+-------------+-------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| ID | int(2) | NO | PRI | NULL | auto_increment |
| First_name | varchar(20) | YES | | NULL | |
| Last_name | varchar(30) | YES | | NULL | |
| Start_date | date | YES | | NULL | |
| Salary | int(6) | YES | | NULL | |
| city | varchar(20) | YES | | NULL | |
| description | varchar(20) | YES | | NULL | |
+-------------+-------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
7 rows in set (0.05 sec)
mysql>
mysql> drop table employee;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)
mysql>