Navicate MySQL is certainly the tool of choice for my DBA needs. As a developer/DBA, I handle large amounts of data, and am continuously altering and adding databases, tables and fields. Navicat has certainly helped me in this aspect.

This is not a tutorial for Navicat, but this will be coming soon. Right now, I want to introduce some capabilities of Navicat, and show how it differs from other database tools. First, here is a list of features for Navicat:

1. Timeout Reconnection for SQL server
2. Data and Structure Synchronization
3. New Query Builder – create query from different databases
4. Query Parameter
5. SQL Console
6. View Builder
7. Views, Stored Procedure and Triggers creation
8. Private Key for SSH Tunnel
9. Supports all MySQL versions
10. SSH Tunnel
11. HTTP Tunnel
12. Foreign Keys
13. Foreign Key Data Selection
14. Unicode and Character Set Support
15. Edit text in Blob field
16. Print Table Structure
17. Import data from ODBC
18. Import / Export data up to 18 most popular formats including MS Access, MS Excel, XML, PDF and TXT.
19. Create Schedule for Backup, Import / Export, Data Transfer, Saved Queries and Data Synchronization.
20. Create Reports with visual Report Builder
21. Report Archive – Reports can be saved as an archive file (.raf) for backup and increased portability.
22. Create Report Archive from command line

The best advantage is PremiumSoft keeps up with the MySQL versions! Yes, you heard me correctly. When MySQL 5 went into production, this tool had already supported stored procedures, triggers, views, and other MySQL 5 features! Keep in mind that I have tried quite a few tools in my time to include SQLYog (decent, but just not enough features), phpMyAdmin (too slow, but is web based and free), MySQL Query Browser (crashes all the time, but is free), MySQL Administrator (is okay, but doesn’t do a whole lot), MySQL Maestro (just boring and useless IN MY OPINION!), as well as others.

If you want to download a trial version of Navicat, go to http://www.navicat.com/detail.html. They have different licenses and it works on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X.

If you do download the trial, please post comments on here for your experience.

*NOTE* I am in NO WAY affiliated with PremiumSoft CyberTech Ltd, so don’t cry that I work for them.