UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi all, I'm glad there's a section called UNIX for dummies on this forum cause when it comes to UNIX, I am certainly a dummie. I honestly don't have a clue about 98% of the UNIX commands out there so forgive me if this is a really stupid question.

I'm trying to set up a MySQL server on my Mac and I'm having trouble starting the server now that it's been installed, I think... I've checked the MySQL online manual and it suggested that I need to find out wether or not it's already running by using the command line: "ps xa | grep mysqld". So I did and here's what I got in response: "966 std S+ 0:00.00 grep mysqld". The problem is, I have NO idea what that means and the MySQL documentation doesn't actually tell me what I should get as a result. Can any of you please translate that for me? Does that mean the MySQL server is running or not? Thanks for your patience and understanding with my neivety.

If the server were up you would have seen two lines of output. That one line came from the | grep part of the command.

edit - the server is not up.

Thanks Jim! That's all I needed to know. Any ideas where I can find a good beginners manual on UNIX commands and how to understand how UNIX works?

Try 'UNIX for Dummies' or Osbourne publishing: 'UNIX the complete reference'

It's much less intimidating when you know what ps does, and what grep means. ps xa generates a report showing all running processes, one process per line. Try running it by itself, you'll see what I mean.

'| grep mysql' feeds that report through the 'grep' command, which will only print lines that have 'mysql' in them. If mysql was running, you'd see a whole bunch of things named mysql, but since it's not, all you see is the one thing running on the system that has grep anywhere in it's name or options -- the program you just ran, 'grep mysql'. Isn't multitasking fun?

Thank you! That's a great explination. It makes a little more sense to me now.

to begin with UNIX try this one:

www.UnixAcademy.com

or to go futher Emi Nemeth "UNIX System Administration" handbook.

Hope it helps.