Agh! MySql

[mccormicky]

how do you find mysql if your client can't tell you ? Is there a way to establish a mysql connection if you don't have anything to go on? Or is that trying to be psychic?

[ses5909]

When you say.. how to you find mysql..do you mean figure out what the host is? A lot of times it is localhost or mysql.domain.com(.net.whatever).

If they don't know the host I usually have to look through the docs of the host to find it.

[Jelena]

And you can't connect without knowing username/password. But if you have access to cpanel or something, you should be able to find username/host/db name somewhere. However, password is hardly to be shown anywhere, so you would have to create new or reset old one, which I presume is not acceptable.

[mccormicky]

I hate to sound really dumb but how do you find out who the hosting provider
is if the owner doesn't know it? Do a whois?
I wish there were a cpanel. There might even be but I have no idea where to find it...
This has got to be the suckiest job I ever accepted.

[goldfries]

find out the nameserver for those domains, it's usually the best way to find out who's their host. :)

another way is to check their bills. the owner of the domain (or whoever's handling it) still needs to pay for hosting, so the bill will lead you to the host.

a typical cpanel login is as easy as http://www.<domain>.com.<whatever.extension.they.have>/cpanel/

[mccormicky]

I found this online toolhttp://www.whoishostingthis.com/
and so at least now I know who the host is!
At least that's one mystery solved! Of course their tech support is closed until Monday.

[SarahG]

Obvious question (maybe) but have you checked the error returned by a connection attempt to see if the address of mysql is correct or wrong, or perhaps the database simply doesn't exist?

If the site has cPanel then you'll usually get to it either by domain.com/cpanel or https//domain.com:2083/

[Michael Martin]

And another thought, do they actually have mySQL?

Not every host offers it with every plan.

[mccormicky]

And another thought, do they actually have mySQL?

Not every host offers it with every plan.
This is why I need some help with mysql!
Most of you guys are light years more advanced than I am (all I have ever done is put in the databasename/password and sometimes even that was a struggle )
But I got back into the server files and I found the cpanel and this thing
/usr/sbin/mysqld Ver 4.0.25-standard for pc-linux-gnu on i686 (Official MySQL RPM)
I'm guessing here but does that mean there's a version of mysql available?
I thought everyone had moved on to ver 5 but I guess not.

[mccormicky]

hah! The cpanel showed me everything,thanks for telling me about it! You guys rock.

[ses5909]

Glad you got it. I'm going to guess the majority of people are still using version 4 of MySql. Could be wrong though!

[mccormicky]

Actually Sarah you're right about that. I just did a Google search on that exact subject. I was able to install WP to the site and things are moving right along.
The cpanel they have installed is very good. I had to chmod(?) permissions to all the theme files up to 0777, via ftp they didn't stick but from the cpanel they did.

[goldfries]

i use SmartFTP. chmods easily.

[SarahG]

A lot of hosts will still be on PHP 4 and MySQL 4 as certain open source scripts don't run too well on the newer versions. I think osCommerce (probably the biggest issue) now runs on php5, not sure about mysql5 though. Not sure about phpBB though.