Installing MariaDB on CentOS 8

July 10, 2024·Utho

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MariaDB, a fork of the widely used MySQL database management system, is recognized as a complete drop-in replacement for MySQL. It was established in 2009 by one of MySQL’s original developers following Oracle’s acquisition of MySQL during the Sun Microsystems merger. Today, MariaDB is maintained and developed by the MariaDB Foundation and community contributors, committed to maintaining its status as GNU GPL software.

MariaDB has replaced MySQL as the default database system in the CentOS 8 repositories. Although installing MySQL on CentOS 8 is straightforward, MariaDB is recommended due to its official support and minimal likelihood of compatibility issues with other repository software.

This guide is intended for a non-root user. Commands that require elevated privileges are prefixed with sudo. If you're unfamiliar with the sudo command, refer to our Users and Groups guide for more information.

Before You Begin

If you haven’t already, create a Utho account and Compute Instance. Refer to our Getting Started with Utho and Creating a Compute Instance guides.

Follow our Setting Up and Securing a Compute Instance guide to update your system, configure your hostname, set the timezone, create a limited user account, and enhance SSH access security.

To check your hostname run:

    hostname
    hostname -f

The first command should show your short hostname, and the second should show your fully qualified domain name (FQDN) if you have one assigned.

Install and Setup MariaDB

Install MariaDB using the package manager.

sudo yum install mariadb-server

Enable MariaDB to start on boot and then start the service:

sudo systemctl enable mariadb
sudo systemctl start mariadb

By default, MariaDB binds to localhost (127.0.0.2). For details on connecting to a remote database using SSH, refer to our MySQL remote access guide, which is also applicable to MariaDB.

Allowing unrestricted access to MariaDB on a public IP not advised but you may change the address it listens on by modifying the `bind-address` parameter in `/etc/my.cnf`. If you decide to bind MariaDB to your public IP, you should implement firewall rules that only allow connections from specific IP addresses.

Securing the Installation

Run the mysql_secure_installation script to address several security concerns in a default MariaDB installation:
```
sudo mysql_secure_installation
```

During setup, you’ll have the option to modify the MariaDB root password, remove anonymous user accounts, disable root logins outside of localhost, and remove test databases. It’s recommended to answer ‘yes’ to these options. For more information about this script, refer to the MariaDB Knowledge Base.

MariaDB Client

The standard tool for interacting with MariaDB is the mariadb client, which installs with the mariadb-server package. The MariaDB client is used through a terminal using the mysql command.

Root Login

Log into MariaDB as the root user:
```
sudo mysql -u root -p
```
When prompted, enter the root password you assigned when the mysql_secure_installation script was run.
You’ll then be presented with a welcome header and the MariaDB prompt as shown below:
```
MariaDB [(none)]>
```

To generate a list of commands for the MariaDB prompt, enter \h. You’ll then see:

General information about MariaDB can be found at
http://mariadb.org

List of all MySQL commands:
Note that all text commands must be first on line and end with ';'
?         (\?) Synonym for `help'.
clear     (\c) Clear the current input statement.
connect   (\r) Reconnect to the server. Optional arguments are db and host.
delimiter (\d) Set statement delimiter.
edit      (\e) Edit command with $EDITOR.
ego       (\G) Send command to mysql server, display result vertically.
exit      (\q) Exit mysql. Same as quit.
go        (\g) Send command to mysql server.
help      (\h) Display this help.
nopager   (\n) Disable pager, print to stdout.
notee     (\t) Don't write into outfile.
pager     (\P) Set PAGER [to_pager]. Print the query results via PAGER.
print     (\p) Print current command.
prompt    (\R) Change your mysql prompt.
quit      (\q) Quit mysql.
rehash    (\#) Rebuild completion hash.
source    (\.) Execute an SQL script file. Takes a file name as an argument.
status    (\s) Get status information from the server.
system    (\!) Execute a system shell command.
tee       (\T) Set outfile [to_outfile]. Append everything into given outfile.
use       (\u) Use another database. Takes database name as argument.
charset   (\C) Switch to another charset. Might be needed for processing binlog with multi-byte charsets.
warnings  (\W) Show warnings after every statement.
nowarning (\w) Don't show warnings after every statement.

For server side help, type 'help contents'

MariaDB [(none)]>

Using MariaDB

Create a New MariaDB User and Database

If you’re not already logged in, log into the database again. This time, if you set a password above, enter it at the prompt.
```
sudo mysql -u root -p
```
In the example below, testdb is the name of the database, testuser is the user, and password is the user’s password. You should replace password with a secure password:
```
 CREATE DATABASE testdb;
 CREATE user 'testuser'@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
 GRANT ALL ON testdb.* TO 'testuser' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
```
You can shorten this process by creating the user while assigning database permissions:
```
 CREATE DATABASE testdb;
 GRANT ALL ON testdb.* TO 'testuser' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
```
Then exit MariaDB:
```
exit;
```

Create a Sample Table

Log back in as testuser:
```
sudo mysql -u testuser -p
```
Create a sample table called customers:
```
USE testdb;
CREATE TABLE customers (customer_id INT NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, first_name TEXT, last_name TEXT);
```
- This creates a table with a customer_id field of the type INT for integer.
  - This field is auto-incremented for new records and used as the primary key.
- Two other fields are created, first_name and last_name for storing the customer’s name.

View the new table:

SHOW TABLES;

+------------------+
| Tables_in_testdb |
+------------------+
| customers        |
+------------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

Add some data:

INSERT INTO customers (first_name, last_name) VALUES ('John', 'Doe');

View the data:

SELECT * FROM customers;

+-------------+------------+-----------+
| customer_id | first_name | last_name |
+-------------+------------+-----------+
|           1 | John       | Doe       |
+-------------+------------+-----------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

Then exit MariaDB:
```
exit;
```

Reset the MariaDB Root Password

If you forget your root MariaDB password, it can be reset.

Stop the current MariaDB server instance.
```
sudo systemctl stop mariadb
```
Then execute the following command which will allow the database to start without loading the grant tables or networking.
```
sudo systemctl set-environment MYSQLD_OPTS="--skip-grant-tables --skip-networking"
```
Restart MariaDB:
```
sudo systemctl start mariadb
```
Login to the MariaDB server with the root account, this time without supplying a password:
```
sudo mysql -u root
```

Use the following commands to reset root’s password. Replace password with a strong password:

FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
UPDATE mysql.user SET password = PASSWORD('password') WHERE user = 'root';

Update the authentication methods for the root password:

UPDATE mysql.user SET authentication_string = '' WHERE user = 'root';
UPDATE mysql.user SET plugin = '' WHERE user = 'root';
exit;

Revert the environment settings to allow the database to start with grant tables and networking:
```
sudo systemctl unset-environment MYSQLD_OPTS
```
Then restart MariaDB:
```
sudo systemctl start mariadb
```
You should now be able to log into the database with your new root password:
```
sudo mysql -u root -p
```

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