If you have lost your root user password for MySQL, you can reset it with the following procedure:

  1. Take down the mysqld server by sending a kill (not kill -9) to the mysqld server. The pid is stored in a .pid file, which is normally in the MySQL database directory:
    Example: shell> kill `cat /your-mysql-data-directory/hostname.pid`
    In Red Hat you can also stop the databse with:
    Example: shell> service mysqld stop
    You must be either the Unix root user or the same user the server runs as to do this.
  2. Restart mysqld with the --skip-grant-tables option.
  3. Connect to the mysqld server with
    Option 1:mysql -h hostname mysql and change the password with a GRANT command.
    See MySQL website: MySQL: 7.35 GRANT and REVOKE Syntax
    Option 2: shell> mysqladmin -h hostname -u user password 'new password'
  4. Load the privilege tables with: "shell> mysqladmin -h hostname flush-privileges” or with the SQL command "mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;".


Note: Note that after you started mysqld with --skip-grant-tables, any usage of GRANT commands will give you an Unknown command error until you have executed FLUSH PRIVILEGES.

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