The relational system's infrastructure is stored in tables that follow a predetermined structure. The data in these tables is generated and maintained by phpMyAdmin on the basis of our actions from the interface.
These metadata tables contain, for all storage engines, information to support the special phpMyAdmin's features like bookmarks and transformations. Moreover, for non-InnoDB tables, relations between tables are kept in this infrastructure.
There are two possible places to store these tables:
In a user's database. Thus every web developer owning a database can benefit from these features.
In a dedicated database, which we call pmadb (phpMyAdmin database). In a multi-user installation (discussed later), this database may be accessible for a number of users while keeping the metadata private.
Because this infrastructure does not exist by default, and because phpMyAdmin's developers want to promote it...