Chapter 3 Installing MySQL Using a Development Source Tree

Clone the MySQL Git repository to your machine. The following command clones the MySQL Git repository to a directory named mysql-server. The download size is approximately 437 MB. The initial download will take some time to complete, depending on the speed of your connection.

~$ git clone https://github.com/mysql/mysql-server.git 
Cloning into 'mysql-server'...
remote: Counting objects: 1035465, done.
remote: Total 1035465 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0)
Receiving objects: 100% (1035465/1035465), 437.48 MiB | 5.10 MiB/s, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (855607/855607), done.
Checking connectivity... done.
Checking out files: 100% (21902/21902), done.

When the clone operation completes, the contents of your local MySQL Git repository appear similar to the following:

~$ cd mysql-server
 
~/mysql-server$ ls
BUILD            COPYING             libmysqld    regex          unittest
BUILD-CMAKE      dbug                libservices  scripts        VERSION
client           Docs                man          sql            vio
cmake            extra               mysql-test   sql-common     win
CMakeLists.txt   include             mysys        storage        zlib
cmd-line-utils   INSTALL-SOURCE      packaging    strings
config.h.cmake   INSTALL-WIN-SOURCE  plugin       support-files
configure.cmake  libmysql            README       tests

Use the git branch -r command to view the remote tracking branches for the MySQL repository.

~/mysql-server$ git branch -r
  origin/5.5
  origin/5.6
  origin/5.7
  origin/HEAD -> origin/5.7
  origin/cluster-7.2
  origin/cluster-7.3
  origin/cluster-7.4

To view the branches that are checked out in your local repository, issue the git branch command. When you cloned the MySQL Git repository, the MySQL 5.7 branch was checked out automatically. The asterisk identifies the 5.7 branch as the active branch.

~/mysql-server$ git branch
* 5.7

To check out a different MySQL branch, run the git checkout command, specifying the branch name. For example, to checkout the MySQL 5.5 branch:

~/mysql-server$ git checkout 5.5
Branch 5.5 set up to track remote branch 5.5 from origin.
Switched to a new branch '5.5'

Run git branch to verify that the MySQL 5.5 branch is present. MySQL 5.5, which is the last branch you checked out, is marked by an asterisk indicating that it is the active branch.

~/mysql-server$ git branch
* 5.5
  5.7

Use the git checkout command to switch back to the MySQL 5.7 branch:

~/mysql-server$ git checkout 5.7

To obtain changes made after your initial setup of the MySQL Git repository, switch to the branch you want to update and issue the git pull command:

~/mysql-server$ git checkout 5.7
~/mysql-server$ git pull

To examine the commit history, use the git log option:

~/mysql-server$ git log

You can also browse commit history and source code on the GitHub MySQL site.

If you see changes or code that you have a question about, send an email to the MySQL internals mailing list. See MySQL Mailing Lists. For information about contributing a patch, see Contributing to MySQL Server.

After you have cloned the MySQL Git repository and have checked out the branch you want to build, you can build MySQL Server from the source code. Instructions are provided in Chapter 2, Installing MySQL Using a Standard Source Distribution, except that you skip the part about obtaining and unpacking the distribution.

Be careful about installing a build from a distribution source tree on a production machine. The installation command may overwrite your live release installation. If you already have MySQL installed and do not want to overwrite it, run CMake with values for the CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX, MYSQL_TCP_PORT, and MYSQL_UNIX_ADDR options different from those used by your production server. For additional information about preventing multiple servers from interfering with each other, see Running Multiple MySQL Instances on One Machine.

Play hard with your new installation. For example, try to make new features crash. Start by running make test. See The MySQL Test Suite.