How to Upgrade MySQL 5.1 to MariaDB 10.0 on CentOS 6

MariaDB is a drop-in replacement for MySQL. It is easy to install, offers many speed and performance improvements, and is easy to integrate into most MySQL deployments. Answers for compatibility questions can be found at: MariaDB versus MySQL – Compatibility. MariaDB offers more storage engines than MySQL, including Cassandra (NoSQL), XtraDB (drop-in replacement for InnoDB), and OQGRAPH.

• These instructions are intended for upgrading from MySQL 5.1 to MariaDB 10.0 on CentOS 6.
• I’ll be working from a Liquid Web Core Managed CentOS 6.5 server, and I’ll be logged in as root.

The proper upgrade path from MySQL 5.1 to MariaDB 10.0 is as follows:

1. MySQL 5.1

2. MariaDB 5.5

3. MariaDB 10.0

Follow our tutorial on upgrading to MariaDB 5.5 on CentOS 6, and then come back to this tutorial!

First, you’ll follow a simple best practice: ensuring the list of available packages is up to date before installing anything new:

yum -y update

Then disable the MariaDB 5.5 repo:

mv /etc/yum.repos.d/MariaDB55.repo /etc/yum.repos.d/MariaDB55.repo.disabled

Now find which repo you should use with the MariaDB repository generator. We’re going to add the CentOS 6 (64 bit) MariaDB 10.0 repository.

For a refresher on editing files with vim see: New User Tutorial: Overview of the Vim Text Editor

vim /etc/yum.repos.d/MariaDB10.repo

# MariaDB 10.0 CentOS repository list – created 2014-10-10 17:33 UTC
# http://mariadb.org/mariadb/repositories/
[mariadb] name = MariaDB
baseurl = http://yum.mariadb.org/10.0/centos6-amd64
gpgkey=https://yum.mariadb.org/RPM-GPG-KEY-MariaDB
gpgcheck=1

Then exit and save the file with the command :wq .

MariaDB may have dependencies such as socat that are a part of Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux (EPEL), which is a community repository of non-standard packages for the RHEL distribution. To install the EPEL repository:

rpm -iUvh http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/6/x86_64/epel-release-6-8.noarch.rpm

Stop MariaDB:

service mysql stop

Remove the existing MariaDB packages:

yum -y remove mysql-server mysql-client

Clean-up the repository cache information with the following command:

yum clean all

At this point, installing MariaDB 10.0 is as simple as running just one command:

yum -y install MariaDB-server MariaDB-client

And then start MariaDB again:

service mysql start

Be sure that MariaDB is set to start at boot:

chkconfig mysql on

Run mysql_upgrade:

mysql_upgrade

Verify MySQL is now MariaDB by using the command client:

mysql

Welcome to the MariaDB monitor. Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MariaDB connection id is 13
Server version: 10.0.14-MariaDB MariaDB Server

Copyright (c) 2000, 2014, Oracle, SkySQL Ab and others.

Type ‘help;’ or ‘\h’ for help. Type ‘\c’ to clear the current input statement.

MariaDB [(none)]>