Many Linux distributions include a version of the MySQL server, client tools, and development components in their native software repositories and can be installed with the platforms' standard package management systems. This section provides basic instructions for installing MySQL using those package management systems.
Native package installations can take care of the download and dependencies required to run MySQL, but the MySQL version will often be some way behind the currently available release. You will also normally be unable to install development releases, as these are not usually made available in the native repository.
Distribution specific instructions are shown below:
Red Hat Linux, Fedora, CentOS
For Red Hat and similar distributions, the MySQL distribution
is divided into a number of separate packages,
mysql for the client tools,
mysql-server for the server and associated
tools, and mysql-libs for the libraries.
The libraries are required if you want to provide connectivity
from different languages and environments such as Perl, Python
and others.
To install, use the yum command to specify the packages that you want to install. For example:
root-shell> yum install mysql mysql-server mysql-libs mysql-server Loaded plugins: presto, refresh-packagekit Setting up Install Process Resolving Dependencies --> Running transaction check ---> Package mysql.x86_64 0:5.1.48-2.fc13 set to be updated ---> Package mysql-libs.x86_64 0:5.1.48-2.fc13 set to be updated ---> Package mysql-server.x86_64 0:5.1.48-2.fc13 set to be updated --> Processing Dependency: perl-DBD-MySQL for package: mysql-server-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64 --> Running transaction check ---> Package perl-DBD-MySQL.x86_64 0:4.017-1.fc13 set to be updated --> Finished Dependency Resolution Dependencies Resolved ================================================================================ Package Arch Version Repository Size ================================================================================ Installing: mysql x86_64 5.1.48-2.fc13 updates 889 k mysql-libs x86_64 5.1.48-2.fc13 updates 1.2 M mysql-server x86_64 5.1.48-2.fc13 updates 8.1 M Installing for dependencies: perl-DBD-MySQL x86_64 4.017-1.fc13 updates 136 k Transaction Summary ================================================================================ Install 4 Package(s) Upgrade 0 Package(s) Total download size: 10 M Installed size: 30 M Is this ok [y/N]: y Downloading Packages: Setting up and reading Presto delta metadata Processing delta metadata Package(s) data still to download: 10 M (1/4): mysql-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64.rpm | 889 kB 00:04 (2/4): mysql-libs-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64.rpm | 1.2 MB 00:06 (3/4): mysql-server-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64.rpm | 8.1 MB 00:40 (4/4): perl-DBD-MySQL-4.017-1.fc13.x86_64.rpm | 136 kB 00:00 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Total 201 kB/s | 10 MB 00:52 Running rpm_check_debug Running Transaction Test Transaction Test Succeeded Running Transaction Installing : mysql-libs-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64 1/4 Installing : mysql-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64 2/4 Installing : perl-DBD-MySQL-4.017-1.fc13.x86_64 3/4 Installing : mysql-server-5.1.48-2.fc13.x86_64 4/4 Installed: mysql.x86_64 0:5.1.48-2.fc13 mysql-libs.x86_64 0:5.1.48-2.fc13 mysql-server.x86_64 0:5.1.48-2.fc13 Dependency Installed: perl-DBD-MySQL.x86_64 0:4.017-1.fc13 Complete!
MySQL and the MySQL server should now be installed. A sample
configuration file is installed into
/etc/my.cnf. An init script, to start and
stop the server, will have been installed into
/etc/init.d/mysqld. To start the MySQL
server use service:
root-shell> service mysqld start
To enable the server to be started and stopped automatically during boot, use chkconfig:
root-shell> chkconfig --levels 235 mysqld on
Which enables the MySQL server to be started (and stopped) automatically at the specified the run levels.
The database tables will have been automatically created for you, if they do not already exist. You should, however, run mysql_secure_installation to set the root passwords on your server.
Debian, Ubuntu, Kubuntu
On Debian and related distributions, there are two packages,
mysql-client and
mysql-server, for the client and server
components respectively. You should specify an explicit
version, for example mysql-client-5.1, to
ensure that you install the version of MySQL that you want.
To download and install, including any dependencies, use the apt-get command, specifying the packages that you want to install.
Before installing, make sure that you update your
apt-get index files to ensure you are
downloading the latest available version.
A sample installation of the MySQL packages might look like this (some sections trimmed for clarity):
root-shell> apt-get install mysql-client-5.1 mysql-server-5.1 Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required: linux-headers-2.6.28-11 linux-headers-2.6.28-11-generic Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them. The following extra packages will be installed: bsd-mailx libdbd-mysql-perl libdbi-perl libhtml-template-perl libmysqlclient15off libmysqlclient16 libnet-daemon-perl libplrpc-perl mailx mysql-common postfix Suggested packages: dbishell libipc-sharedcache-perl tinyca procmail postfix-mysql postfix-pgsql postfix-ldap postfix-pcre sasl2-bin resolvconf postfix-cdb The following NEW packages will be installed bsd-mailx libdbd-mysql-perl libdbi-perl libhtml-template-perl libmysqlclient15off libmysqlclient16 libnet-daemon-perl libplrpc-perl mailx mysql-client-5.1 mysql-common mysql-server-5.1 postfix 0 upgraded, 13 newly installed, 0 to remove and 182 not upgraded. Need to get 1907kB/25.3MB of archives. After this operation, 59.5MB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Y Get: 1 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty-updates/main mysql-common 5.1.30really5.0.75-0ubuntu10.5 [63.6kB] Get: 2 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty-updates/main libmysqlclient15off 5.1.30really5.0.75-0ubuntu10.5 [1843kB] Fetched 1907kB in 9s (205kB/s) Preconfiguring packages ... Selecting previously deselected package mysql-common. (Reading database ... 121260 files and directories currently installed.) ... Processing 1 added doc-base file(s)... Registering documents with scrollkeeper... Setting up libnet-daemon-perl (0.43-1) ... Setting up libplrpc-perl (0.2020-1) ... Setting up libdbi-perl (1.607-1) ... Setting up libmysqlclient15off (5.1.30really5.0.75-0ubuntu10.5) ... Setting up libdbd-mysql-perl (4.008-1) ... Setting up libmysqlclient16 (5.1.31-1ubuntu2) ... Setting up mysql-client-5.1 (5.1.31-1ubuntu2) ... Setting up mysql-server-5.1 (5.1.31-1ubuntu2) ... * Stopping MySQL database server mysqld ...done. 100825 11:46:15 InnoDB: Started; log sequence number 0 46409 100825 11:46:15 InnoDB: Starting shutdown... 100825 11:46:17 InnoDB: Shutdown completed; log sequence number 0 46409 100825 11:46:17 [Warning] Forcing shutdown of 1 plugins * Starting MySQL database server mysqld ...done. * Checking for corrupt, not cleanly closed and upgrade needing tables. ... Processing triggers for libc6 ... ldconfig deferred processing now taking place
The apt-get command will install a number of packages, including the MySQL server, in order to provide the typical tools and application environment. This can mean that you install a large number of packages in addition to the main MySQL package.
During installation, the initial database will be created, and
you will be prompted for the MySQL root password (and
confirmation). A configuration file will have been created in
/etc/mysql/my.cnf. An init script will
have been created in /etc/init.d/mysql.
The server will already be started. You can manually start and stop the server using:
root-shell> service mysql [start|stop]
The service will automatically be added to the 2, 3 and 4 run levels, with stop scripts in the single, shutdown and restart levels.
Gentoo Linux
As a source-based distribution, installing MySQL on Gentoo involves downloading the source, patching the Gentoo specifics, and then compiling the MySQL server and installing it. This process is handled automatically by the emerge command.
The MySQL server and client tools are provided within a single
package, dev-db/mysql. You can obtain a
list of the versions available to install by looking at the
portage directory for the package:
root-shell> ls /usr/portage/dev-db/mysql/mysql-5.5* mysql-5.5.46.ebuild mysql-5.5.47.ebuild
To install a specific MySQL version, you must specify the entire atom. For example:
root-shell> emerge =dev-db/mysql-5.5.46
After installation, you should initialize the data directory
and set the password for the MySQL
root user (see
Section 2.10.1, “Initializing the Data Directory”).
Alternatively, use the configuration interface to perform
those tasks:
root-shell> emerge --config =dev-db/mysql-5.5.46
During installation, a sample configuration file is created
for you in /etc/mysql/my.cnf, and an init
script is created in /etc/init.d/mysql.
To enable MySQL to start automatically at the normal (default) run levels, use this command:
root-shell> rc-update add mysql default