How to show the column names of a table?

select column_name from information_schema.columns where table_name='table'

The best solution that I found out by myself was the desc table_name command. More information is on List MySQL Tables. This command gives the description of one database table, which is exactly what I was trying to find out.

To make sure you list columns in a table in the current database, use the DATABASE() or SCHEMA() function. It returns NULL if you are not in a current database. This query will show the columns in a table in the order the columns were defined:

SELECT column_name,column_type
FROM information_schema.columns
WHERE table_schema = DATABASE()
AND table_name='table'
ORDER BY ordinal_position;