Back up your mysql database with mysqldump

I don't use this often so I end up googling it every time I need it.

mysqldump -u root -p database_name > sql_dump_file

Now I know exactly where to find it and I don't have to scan a whole article just to get the syntax.

Change "root" to the user you normally use; you an also specify -ppassword (no space between -p and the password) so you don't have to enter the password interactively ... security issues etc but if you're running this from a script I'm not sure what the alternative is.