Handling Special Characters in MySQL Table Names

MySQL reserves certain characters as special characters, which can conflict with table names when used inadvertently. In the given scenario, the exclamation mark (!) in the table name 'e!' caused an error during data insertion.

To address this issue, MySQL allows you to enclose table names with backticks (`) when using special characters. This effectively "escapes" the special character and allows it to be recognized as part of the table name. For example, the following query would execute successfully:

INSERT INTO `e!` (showname, startDateTime, endDateTime) VALUES('E! News ', '2012-05-03 19:00:00', '2012-05-03 20:00:00')

However, it is generally recommended to avoid using special characters in table names to prevent potential issues and improve readability. If necessary, consider using an encoding mechanism to represent special characters in table names.