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November 13, 2022
Updated June 7, 2023

How to reset MySQL and MariaDB root password on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Databases Ubuntu

What is MySQL and MariaDB

MySQL and MariaDB - very popular management systems for SQL-queries based databases. Today there're using for websites, machine learning projects, development and so on.

Why password reset may be needed

The reasons are obvious - current password may be "dropped" after database service upgrade, you can accidentally forget it, your personal passwords storage could be lost etc.

How to reset root password of MySQL and MariaDB services

To set new database service root password (it is NOT "built-in" system root!) please follow rurther steps:

Login to your server as privileged user;

Stop the service;

service mysql stop # for MySQL
service mariadb stop # for MariaDB

pic1

Allow temporary "passwordless" authentication and start the service:

cat << EOF >> /etc/mysql/my.cnf
[mysqld]
skip-grant-tables
EOF
service mysql start

pic2

Authenticate into the database service and set the new password:

mysql
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
ALTER USER 'root'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'NewStr0ngPassword';
exit

pic3

Remove skip-grant-tables directive from configuration file and restart the service:

service mysql stop; sed -i -e '$d' /etc/mysql/my.cnf && sed -i -e '$d' /etc/mysql/my.cnf; service mysql start

pic4

NOTE: I run sed -i -e '$d' twice cause need to delete two last file rows.

Checking and tuning

To check the result just run:

mysql -uroot -p<your_new_password>

pic5

As you see, authorization is successful. To make your further life more comfortable, it is possible to save this password to the special file in your home directory. It will allow you to authenticate without typing password each time:

cat << EOF >> ~/.my.cnf

[client]
user = root
password = <your_new_password>
EOF

pic6

Conclusion

Now you knew how to reset root password of MySQL or MariaDB service, why this operation could be needed and how to make each-day authorisation more comfortable.

 

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