I have a general idea of how to test to see if a database exists with SQL Server.

Is there an equivalent with MySQL? How close is the syntax?

Select 1 from Information_Schema.Schemata where catalog_name='mydatabase'

hi,
to get an idea of how to test this, do an export with "mysqldump user/password -opt --all-databases > db_create.sql". This tools generates a script to recreate the database. It also includes "if exist" statements, to do a drop if necessary.
I hope this will give you the needed statements.

The actual db names are listed with "show databases".
Martin