Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/mysql/mysql.sock' (38)

Question

I am having a big problem trying to connect to mysql. When I run:

/usr/local/mysql/bin/mysql start

I have the following error :

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Answer 1

I also found that this was a permissions problem. I compared the MySQL files to a working install (both on Debian 6 squeeze) and had to make the following ownership changes (where mydatabase is any database(s) you have).

Ownership mysql:mysql:

chown mysql:mysql /var/lib/mysql
chown mysql:mysql /var/lib/mysql/ib*
chown mysql:mysql /var/lib/mysql/mydatabase
chown mysql:mysql /var/lib/mysql/mydatabase/*
chown mysql:mysql /var/lib/mysql/mysql/* 

Ownership mysql:root:

chown mysql:root /var/lib/mysql/mysql
chown mysql:root /var/run/mysqld 

Ownership mysql:adm:

chown mysql:adm /var/log/mysql
chown mysql:adm /var/log/mysql.err
chown mysql:adm /var/log/mysql.log*