Specifying username and password

> mysqldump -u username -p [other options]
Enter password:

If you need to specify the password on the command line (e.g. in a script), you can add it after the -p option without a space:

> mysqldump -u username -ppassword [other options]

If you password contains spaces or special characters, remember to use escaping depending on your shell / system.

Optionally the extended form is:

> mysqldump --user=username --password=password [other options]

(Explicity specifying the password on the commandline is Not Recommended due to security concerns.)