1. Create an EC2 instance

• Creating an EC2 instance on AWS is very easy. You can follow the instruction on this website here or AWS document.

2. Run a MySQL server in a Docker container

• Read docker doc to install docker here.

# check docker version
docker --version

• Pull down the MySQL image from docker

# Pull the latest mysql version
docker pull mysql

• Run MySQL image

# `some-mysql` is the name of your container
# `my-secret-pw` is the password of your root user
# `127.0.0.1:3307:3306` specifying where the port you want mysql to run `<host>:<host port>:<mysql port>`
# `tag` specifying the mysql version you want
docker run --name some-mysql -e MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=my-secret-pw -p 127.0.0.1:3307:3306 -d mysql:tag

• Shows all of the Docker processes actively running to

3. Connect to it from the host machine

3.1. First method: docker exec

You need to run docker exec to run a command in the mysql container. You can read docs for more options and arguments here.

docker container exec [OPTIONS] CONTAINER COMMAND [ARG...]

Follow all steps below to connect to mysql.

• Get the container id

docker ps

• Execute command in mysql container with docker exec.

# `docker exec` run a command in a running container
# `eafb788cfd28` is the container id
# `mysql -uroot -pmy-secret-pw -e 'show databases;'` is the command you want to run in mysql container
# `root` is user `root`
# `mysecert-pw` is your password

docker exec eafb788cfd28 mysql -uroot -pmy-secret-pw -e 'show databases;'

3.2. Second method: mysql client

The second method is short and simpler. You don't need to run docker exec for every command.

• You need to have mysql run on your machine.

# check where mysql in your machine
which mysql

• If you run mysql in your machine without specifying host and post, it will return an error.

mysql -uroot -p123 -e 'show databases;' # error

# `-h` is your host
# `-P` is your host port. Don't be confused it with mysql port.
mysql -uroot -p123 -h 127.0.0.1 -P3307 -e 'show databases;' # correct