These are my favorite MySQL backup and restore one-liners.
Backup
To back up a database named stuff:
time mysqldump -u root -p stuff | gzip > stuff.sql.gz
This pipes the clear text output from mysqldump directly into gzip,
and prints the duration of the operation in the end.
Restore
To restore the stuff database:
time gunzip -c stuff.sql.gz | pv | mysql -u root -p stuff
This decompresses the dump back in clear text, and feeds it to mysql
through pv, which adds the perk of an indication of progress.