MySQL where's the my.cnf path?

Question

I've managed to locate my install directory for MySQL: /usr/local/mysql/

Where can I find the path to my.cnf to know where I should configure the server? I've tried creating a /etc/my.cnf(as shown below) and it had no affect

[mysqld]

#charset
collation_server=utf8_general_ci
character_set_server=utf8
default_character_set=utf8

Answer 1

On a Linux system 'locate my.cnf" will be the fastest solution.

If there are several my.cnf files, all looking likely (e.g. in /etc, /etc/mysql, /opt/mysql/etc, etc.), then you can run strace to see where MySQL binary tries to find its configuration file, but I do think that's an overkill.

Answer 2

strace -fe open /etc/init.d/mysql start 2>&1|grep my.cnf should show you the system call used to open the file.

Answer 3

It seems like the file your cnf created is being superseded by another one. Check out hte default order below.

From

mysqld --verbose --help

Default options are read from the following files in the given order: /etc/my.cnf ~/.my.cnf /etc/my.cnf

Answer 4

How are you sure that your cnf file is not being read?

Have you restarted mysqld since the change?

Have you tried to create a new db and looked at its values?

Answer 5

How did you install MySQL and on what platform?

Brute force method on an unixoid OS:

find / -name my.cnf -print

Answer 6

To install locate and updatedb to be able to run it..

Using fedora, centos run as root:

yum install mlocate

if you are running Ubuntu run:

sudo apt-get install mlocate

After you finish the install run updatedb Fedora (as root):

$updatedb 

Ubuntu:

sudo updatedb

then you can run the locate command as listed above. Again the my.cnf is typically located in /etc. Are you sure mysql is installed? if not do the commands above to install it and replace mlocate with mysqld best of luck!

Answer 7

OK a wild shot in the dark:

If the database is installed in /usr/local/mysql, then try looking in /etc/local for my.cnf

Here is how you can tell if you have a my.cnf

Run this query

SELECT * FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.GLOBAL_VARIABLES
WHERE VARIABLE_NAME IN ('wait_timeout',
'innodb_buffer_pool_size','innodb_log_file_size');

or

SHOW VARIABLES LIKE = 'wait_timeout';
SHOW VARIABLES LIKE = 'innodb_buffer_pool_size';
SHOW VARIABLES LIKE = 'innodb_log_file_size';

If you should get

• wait_timeout 28800
• innodb_log_file_size 5242880
• innodb_buffer_pool_size 8M (MySQL 5.0) or 128M (MySQL 5.1+)

you are running with defaults and there is a possibility that there may not be a my.cnf present.