ERROR 2002 (HY000): Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/tmp/mysql.sock'

I installed MySQL on Mac OS X Mountain Lion with homebrew install mysql, but when I tried mysql -u root I got the following error:

ERROR 2002 (HY000): Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/tmp/mysql.sock' (2)

What does this error mean? How can I fix it?

Solution 1:

You'll need to start MySQL before you can use the mysql command on your terminal. To do this, run brew services start mysql. By default, brew installs the MySQL database without a root password. To secure it run: mysql_secure_installation.

To connect run: mysql -uroot. root is the username name here.

Solution 2:

It's probably because MySQL is installed but not yet running.

To verify that it's running, open up Activity Monitor and under "All Processes", search and verify you see the process "mysqld".

You can start it by installing "MySQL.prefPane".

Here is the complete tutorial which helped me: http://obscuredclarity.blogspot.in/2009/08/install-mysql-on-mac-os-x.html

Solution 3:

This happened after the homebrew install and occurs due to permission issues. The following commands fixed the issue.

sudo chown -R _mysql:mysql /usr/local/var/mysql

sudo mysql.server start

Solution 4:

Run: brew info mysql

And follow the instructions. From the description in the formula:

Set up databases to run AS YOUR USER ACCOUNT with:
    unset TMPDIR
    mysql_install_db --verbose --user=`whoami` --basedir="$(brew --prefix mysql)" --datadir=/usr/local/var/mysql --tmpdir=/tmp

To set up base tables in another folder, or use a different user to run
mysqld, view the help for mysql_install_db:
    mysql_install_db --help

and view the MySQL documentation:
  * http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.5/en/mysql-install-db.html
  * http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.5/en/default-privileges.html

Hope this helps.