Who you are and who you have been authenticated as

In Mysql, to tell who you are and who you have been authenticated as, use the user() and current_user() functions.

Example:

mysql> select user(), current_user() \G
        user(): nick@localhost
current_user(): nick@%

This is useful because you may have overlapping authentication rules, such as 'nick@192.168.%' and 'nick@%' and 'nick@localhost'.

Mysql permissions are confusing and frustrating, hopefully this helps debug some of its issues.