How to comment / document a table?

Question

I saw in a Postgresql database that each table and each table field has a comment explaining what each one is for. Following model below:

I want to know if in Mysql it is possible to do something similar. If not, there is an external program to do this documentation?

Answer 1

Yes it is possible just add the clasp COMMENT in the definition of the column or table.

CREATE TABLE pessoa(
  id INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT COMMENT 'chave primária',
  nome VARCHAR(50) COMMENT 'coluna com o nome',
  email VARCHAR(50) COMMENT 'contato da pessoas',
  PRIMARY KEY(id)
)COMMENT 'tabela contendo informações de pessoas'

To retrieve comments from tables/columns you can use the command:

SHOW FULL COLUMNS FROM pessoa

For a more refined query use the information_schema:

SELECT table_name, table_comment FROM information_schema.tables
WHERE table_schema = 'nome_da_database'

If you use the Workbench click on the icon with the letter i on the flap info the comments in the table and in the columns comments for each column.

Based on: Show Comment of Fields FROM Mysql Table