Hopefully you are using usernames and passwords when accessing your MySQL databases. Security can make it hard to quickly jump in and start working in the MySQL shell if your password is quite complicated.

Here’s the solution:

create a ~/.my.cnf file and fill it with:

[client]
database=yourDBname
user=yourDBusername
password=yourSuperSecretPassword

Next, make sure that only you can read it:

chmod 600 ~/.my.cnf

Lastly, test it out:

user@host:~$ mysql
Reading table information for completion of table and column names
You can turn off this feature to get a quicker startup with -A

Welcome to the MySQL monitor. Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 65863
Server version: 5.5.31-0ubuntu0.12.04.2 (Ubuntu)

Copyright (c) 2000, 2013, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation and/or its
affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective
owners.

Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the current input statement.

mysql> show tables;
+-----------------------+
| Tables_in_yourDBname |
+-----------------------+
| wp_commentmeta |
| wp_comments |
| wp_links |
| wp_options |
| wp_postmeta |
| wp_posts |
| wp_term_relationships |
| wp_term_taxonomy |
| wp_terms |
| wp_usermeta |
| wp_users |
+-----------------------+
11 rows in set (0.00 sec)

mysql>

Voila! In there without having to worry about needing to look up your password.