How to restore mysql database using files on data folder?

Restoring MySQL InnoDB Files on Windows

The InnoDB type files were a more difficult task, and that is why I am writing this post. I had a hard time finding out how to do it, but I pieced together enough information to accomplish the task. Now, in an effort to give back, I’ll explain exactly what I did to get it restored.

In our back-ups we had the following files:

\MySQL\MySQL Server 4.1\data\ibdata1
\MySQL\MySQL Server 4.1\data\ib_logfile0
\MySQL\MySQL Server 4.1\data\ib_logfile1

Plus, in the data folder there were was a folder with the name of the database I was restoring that contained *.frm files (table_name.frm).

I did the restore on my development machine rather than the actual server because I didn’t want to screw up what was working on the server. I already had MySQL installed from an XAMPP install. (My development box is running Windows XP SP2). XAMPP installs MySQL a little differently than the regular MySQL install, so if it helps to follow what I did here, you may want to install it.

I first stopped my MySQL service using XAMPP’s control panel.

I moved the files listed above (ib* files and the folder containing the *.frm files) to the my local mysql data folder (C:\Program Files\xampp\mysql\data).

I then edited my.cnf (located in C:\Program Files\xampp\mysql\bin) and made the following changes (starting at line 66 for me):

OLD:

skip-innodb
#innodb_data_home_dir = C:/Program Files/xampp/mysql/data/
#innodb_data_file_path = ibdata1:10M:autoextend
#innodb_log_group_home_dir = C:/Program Files/xampp/mysql/data/
#innodb_log_arch_dir = C:/Program Files/xampp/mysql/data/
#set-variable = innodb_buffer_pool_size=16M
#set-variable = innodb_additional_mem_pool_size=2M
#set-variable = innodb_log_file_size=5M
#set-variable = innodb_log_buffer_size=8M
#innodb_flush_log_at_trx_commit=1
#set-variable = innodb_lock_wait_timeout=5

NEW:

#skip-innodb
innodb_data_home_dir = C:/Program Files/xampp/mysql/data/
innodb_data_file_path = ibdata1:10M:autoextend
innodb_log_group_home_dir = C:/Program Files/xampp/mysql/data/
innodb_log_arch_dir = C:/Program Files/xampp/mysql/data/
set-variable = innodb_buffer_pool_size=16M
set-variable = innodb_additional_mem_pool_size=2M
set-variable = innodb_log_file_size=170M
set-variable = innodb_log_buffer_size=8M
innodb_flush_log_at_trx_commit=1
set-variable = innodb_lock_wait_timeout=50

(I had to set innodb_log_file_size to the actual size of my log file)

I then edited the XAMPP batch file that starts the mysql service (C:\Program Files\xampp\mysql_start.bat). I added –innodb_force_recovery=6 to the end of the call to mysqld. So line 8 of that file now read:

mysql\bin\mysqld –defaults-file=mysql\bin\my.cnf –standalone –console –innodb_force_recovery=6

This did the trick! My databases were recovered on my machine. I used SQLyog to do a sql dump of the database to restore it on our production server.

Source


Further Resources

  • Forcing InnoDB Recovery

  • InnoDB Recovery Modes

  • Corrupt InnoDB: Start mysqld only innodb_force_recovery=6