Syntax error on MYSQL Trigger

Question

I'm getting an error on my MYSQL trigger. I've used various form of syntax that I've found both on here and elsewhere on the internet but nothing seems to work. Here are 3 examples of syntax I've used:

>         CREATE TRIGGER LOG_UPDATE BEFORE UPDATE ON WORKLOG
>     FOR EACH ROW BEGIN
>       INSERT INTO WORKLOG_BACKUP VALUES(NULL, CURRENT_TIMESTAMP, NEW.LOGNO, NEW.JOBNO, NEW.EMPLOYEENO, NEW.WORKDATE, NEW.WORKTIME,
> 'UPDATE');    
>     END;
>     
>     CREATE TRIGGER LOG_UPDATE BEFORE UPDATE ON WORKLOG
>     FOR EACH ROW BEGIN
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET BACKUPSTAMP = CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET LOGNO = NEW.LOGNO,
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET JOBNO = NEW.JOBNO,
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET EMPLOYEENO = NEW.EMPLOYEENO,
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET WORKDATE = NEW.WORKDATE,
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET WORKTIME = NEW.WORKTIME,
>       UPDATE WORKLOG_BACKUP SET CAUSE = 'UPDATE'; 
>     END;
>     
>     CREATE TRIGGER LOG_UPDATE BEFORE UPDATE ON WORKLOG
>     FOR EACH ROW BEGIN
>       INSERT INTO WORKLOG_BACKUP VALUES(
>       SET BACKUPSTAMP = CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
>       SET LOGNO = NEW.LOGNO,
>       SET JOBNO = NEW.JOBNO,
>       SET EMPLOYEENO = NEW.EMPLOYEENO,
>       SET WORKDATE = NEW.WORKDATE,
>       SET WORKTIME = NEW.WORKTIME,
>       SET CAUSE = 'UPDATE');  
>     END;

I'd appriciate any help anyone can provide. I'm using phpmyadmin.

Answer 1

In order for your MySQL client not to interpret the ; that terminates the INSERT statement as the end of the CREATE TRIGGER statement, you must inform it that you wish to use some other statement delimiter.

In the mysql command-line client, you can do this with the DELIMITER command . For example, to change your statement delimiter to a double-semicolon:

DELIMITER ;;

Then you can do:

CREATE TRIGGER LOG_UPDATE BEFORE UPDATE ON WORKLOG FOR EACH ROW BEGIN
  INSERT INTO WORKLOG_BACKUP VALUES (
    NULL,
    CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
    NEW.LOGNO,
    NEW.JOBNO,
    NEW.EMPLOYEENO,
    NEW.WORKDATE,
    NEW.WORKTIME,
    'UPDATE'
  );
END;;

However, because in this case your trigger only contains one statement, you don't need to use a BEGIN ... END compound statement block and could therefore avoid changing delimiters altogether:

CREATE TRIGGER LOG_UPDATE BEFORE UPDATE ON WORKLOG FOR EACH ROW
  INSERT INTO WORKLOG_BACKUP VALUES (
    NULL,
    CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
    NEW.LOGNO,
    NEW.JOBNO,
    NEW.EMPLOYEENO,
    NEW.WORKDATE,
    NEW.WORKTIME,
    'UPDATE'
  )
;