diff --git a/helper b/helper
index 38b2547..ca0e9f9 100644
--- a/helper
+++ b/helper
@@ -231,3 +231,22 @@ git_clone_if_missing() {
     echo "Cloning repository $repo into $target_dir..."
     git clone --quiet --branch main "$repo" "$target_dir"
 }
+
+#
+# Creates a MariaDB database and user
+#
+setup_mariadb() {
+    local mariapwd="$1" dbname="$2" dbuser="$3" dbpass="$4"
+
+    if [[ -z "$mariapwd" || -z "$dbname" || -z "$dbuser" || -z "$dbpass" ]]; then
+        echo "Error: setup_mariadb requires mariapwd, dbname, dbuser, dbpass"
+        exit 1
+    fi
+
+mysql -u root -p"$mariapwd" <<EOF
+CREATE DATABASE IF NOT EXISTS \`$dbname\`;
+CREATE USER IF NOT EXISTS '$dbuser'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY '$dbpass';
+GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON \`$dbname\`.* TO '$dbuser'@'localhost';
+FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
+EOF
+}