Today I’m going to show you how can you can use Docker to run MySQL Server in your development environment. Using Docker to run MySQL is much easier than manually installing it and for when you have multiple instances of MySQL running at the same time. I’m assuming that you already have Docker Community Edtion install on your machine. If you do not have Docker installed follow the instruction for your operating system. here Install MySQL Using Docker If you search online for how to install MySQL using Docker, you will see many different examples on how to do this. I’m going to show how to do it so that you can connect to the database from your IDE and from the applications you are developing. Type this command at the terminal: $ docker run -p 3306:3306 --name hb-mysql-example -e MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=Buster -d mysql Let’s cover what each part of this command is doing: is creating a new Docker container running MySQL. The at the end of the command is saying to use the latest version of MySQL. This command will also download the MySQL image if itis not already downloaded. Run mysql is telling the container to map of your localhost to of the container. -P port 3306 port 3306 is setting the name of the container to . -Name hb-mysql-example is creating the environment variable MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD and setting it’s value to . -E Buster this is telling Docker to run the container in the background. -D List Running Docker Containers You use this following command to list which containers are running: $ docker ps This command will output something like this to the terminal: Starting, Restarting and Stopping Docker Containers Containers do not start up by default when you turn on your machine or do a restart of your machine. Here I will show you how to start, stop and restart containers. Starting a Container To start a container, you use this command: . docker start containerName To start the hb-mysql-example container use this command: $ docker start hb-mysql-example Restarting a Container To restart a container, you use this command: . docker restart containerName To restart the hb-mysql-example container use this command: $ docker restart hb-mysql-example Stopping a Container To stop a container, you use this command: . docker stop containerName To stop the hb-mysql-example container use this command: $ docker stop hb-mysql-example Connecting To MySQL Container From IntelliJ Here I will how to connect to MySQL using IntelliJ. If you do not have IntelliJ, you can download it . here Follow these steps: Open IntelliJ Click on the on the right side of the window. database tab Click on the to add a new database connection. “+” button Select from the list of database servers. MySql Fill in the host, database name, username and password like in the image below and click the . OK button You are now connected to MySQL and can start working with MySQL. Conclusion In this post, you learned how to install MySQL using docker, how to start, restart, and stop containers. You also learn how to connect to MySQL from IntelliJ. Originally published at fluentjava.com on February 4, 2019.