mySQL: Testing connection with query?

Question

I am writing some unit tests to ensure that everything is working as supposed in my application and thought it would be an good idea to write a short test script to ensure that the mySQL connection is working as intended.

Is there any query I can run that will always output something sweet that I can verify the connection upon, without having to think about eventual stored data in the mySQL database?

Answer 1

is there any query I can run that will always output something sweet

This should do it

SELECT 'Something sweet'

Edit
If you don't want something sweet you can always use the built-in functions:

SELECT version()

for more ideas check out the manual:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/information-functions.html

Answer 2

To get more details you can also use SHOW statement:

SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'version%';

+---------------------------------+---------------------------+
| Variable_name                   | Value                     |
+---------------------------------+---------------------------+
| version                         | 5.1.6-alpha-log           |
| version_comment                 | Source distribution       |
| version_compile_machine         | i686                      |
| version_compile_os              | suse-linux                |
+---------------------------------+---------------------------+

http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/show-variables.html