MARIADBD-SAFE(1)

💖 MARIADBD-SAFE 💖 (MariaDB Database System, section 1)

okay so this is the mariadbd-safe page from the MariaDB Database System manual, and bestie, it's a whole vibe. buckle up 🎀

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✨ NAME ✨

mariadbd-safe — the MariaDB server startup script. and yes, plot twist: mariadbd-safe is now a symlink to mariadbd-safe. she contains multitudes 💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

mariadbd-safe options

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

So. mariadbd-safe is the recommended way to start a mariadbd server on Unix. no cap. she's not just a pretty face — she adds safety features, like restarting the server when an error occurs and logging runtime info to an error log file. (we'll get into error logging later in this section, don't worry, we're getting there 🫶)

mariadbd-safe tries to start an executable named mariadbd. but if you want to override that default behavior and say exactly which server you want to run, you pass her a --mariadbd or --mariadbd-version option. you can also use --ledir to point at the directory where mariadbd-safe should go looking for the server.

Many of the options to mariadbd-safe are the same as the options to mariadbd.

Here's a lil rule that matters: options that mariadbd-safe doesn't recognize get passed along to mariadbd if you put them on the command line — but they get ignored if you put them in the [mariadbd-safe] or [mariadbd_safe] groups of an option file. iykyk.

mariadbd-safe reads all her options from the [mariadbd], [server], [mariadbd-safe] and [mariadbd_safe] sections in option files. like, if you write a [mariadbd] section like this, she'll find and use the --log-error option:

[mariadbd]
log-error=error.log

For backward compatibility, mariadbd-safe also reads [safe_mariadbd] sections — though fr fr, you should rename those sections to [mariadbd-safe] in current installations. it's giving legacy 👑

mariadbd-safe supports the options in the following list. she also reads option files and supports the options for processing them. 💖

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🎀 THE OPTIONS 🎀

• --help — display a help message and exit. that's it, that's the whole thing, and honestly? iconic.
• --basedir=path — the path to the MariaDB installation directory.
• --core-file-size=size — the size of the core file that mariadbd should be able to create. the option value gets passed to ulimit -c.
• --crash-script=file — the script to call in the event of mariadbd crashing. 😭
• --datadir=path — the path to the data directory.
• --defaults-extra-file=path — the name of an option file to read in addition to the usual option files. this has to be the first option on the command line if you use it. and heads up: if the file doesn't exist or is otherwise inaccessible, the server will exit with an error.
• --defaults-file=file_name — the name of an option file to read instead of the usual option files. this also must be the first option on the command line if it's used.
• --flush-caches — flush and purge buffers/caches before starting the server. clean slate energy ✨
• --ledir=path — if mariadbd-safe can't find the server, use this option to indicate the path name to the directory where the server is located.
• --log-error=file_name — write the error log to the given file.
• --malloc-lib=lib — preload shared library lib if it's available.
• --mariadbd=prog_name — the name of the server program (in the ledir directory) that you want to start. you need this one if you're using the MariaDB binary distribution but you've got the data directory outside of that binary distribution. and again: if mariadbd-safe can't find the server, use the --ledir option to point at the directory where the server lives.
• --mariadbd-version=suffix — similar to the --mariadbd option, except you only give the suffix for the server program name. the basename is assumed to be mariadbd. so for example, if you use --mariadbd-version=debug, mariadbd-safe starts the mariadbd-debug program in the ledir directory. and if the argument to --mariadbd-version is empty, mariadbd-safe uses mariadbd in the ledir directory.
• --nice=priority — use the nice program to set the server's scheduling priority to the given value.
• --no-auto-restart, --nowatch, --no-watch — exit after starting mariadbd. she's not sticking around to supervise, she's leaving 👋
• --no-defaults — do not read any option files. this must be the first option on the command line if it's used.
• --numa-interleave — run mariadbd with its memory interleaved on all NUMA nodes.
• --open-files-limit=count — the number of files that mariadbd should be able to open. the option value is passed to ulimit -n. and ngl, this is important: you need to start mariadbd-safe as root for this to work properly!
• --pid-file=file_name — the path name of the process ID file.
• --plugin-dir=dir_name — the directory for client-side plugins.
• --port=port_num — the port number the server should use when listening for TCP/IP connections. the port number must be 1024 or higher unless the server is started by the root system user.
• --skip-kill-mariadbd — do not try to kill stray mariadbd processes at startup. (this option works only on Linux, fyi.)
• --socket=path — the Unix socket file the server should use when listening for local connections.
• --syslog, --skip-syslog — --syslog causes error messages to be sent to syslog on systems that support the logger program. --skip-syslog suppresses the use of syslog; messages get written to an error log file.
• --syslog-tag=tag — for logging to syslog, messages from mariadbd-safe and mariadbd are written with a tag of mariadbd-safe and mariadbd, respectively. to specify a suffix for the tag, use --syslog-tag=tag, which modifies the tags to be mariadbd-safe-tag and mariadbd-tag. cute lil family tree 🦋
• --timezone=timezone — set the TZ time zone environment variable to the given option value. consult your operating system documentation for legal time zone specification formats.
• --user={user_name|user_id} — run the mariadbd server as the user having the name user_name or the numeric user ID user_id. (and just so we're clear: "User" here means a system login account, not a MariaDB user listed in the grant tables. different thing entirely 💀)

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💅 about --defaults-file and --defaults-extra-file 💅

If you execute mariadbd-safe with the --defaults-file or --defaults-extra-file option to name an option file, the option must be the first one given on the command line or the option file will not be used. so like, this command will not use the named option file:

mariadb> mariadbd-safe --port=port_num --defaults-file=file_name

instead, do it like this:

mariadb> mariadbd-safe --defaults-file=file_name --port=port_num

order matters, bestie. it's giving first-or-nothing 🌸

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🧚 how she finds the server and the databases 🧚

The mariadbd-safe script is written so that it normally can start a server that was installed from either a source or a binary distribution of MariaDB — even though these types of distributions typically install the server in slightly different locations. mariadbd-safe expects one of the following conditions to be true:

• The server and databases can be found relative to the working directory (the directory from which mariadbd-safe is invoked). For binary distributions, mariadbd-safe looks under its working directory for bin and data directories. For source distributions, it looks for libexec and var directories. This condition should be met if you execute mariadbd-safe from your MariaDB installation directory (for example, /usr/local/mysql for a binary distribution).
• If the server and databases cannot be found relative to the working directory, mariadbd-safe attempts to locate them by absolute path names. Typical locations are /usr/local/libexec and /usr/local/var. The actual locations are determined from the values configured into the distribution at the time it was built. They should be correct if MariaDB is installed in the location specified at configuration time.

Because mariadbd-safe tries to find the server and databases relative to its own working directory, you can install a binary distribution of MariaDB anywhere, as long as you run mariadbd-safe from the MariaDB installation directory:

shell> cd mysql_installation_directory
shell> bin/mariadbd-safe &

If mariadbd-safe fails, even when invoked from the MariaDB installation directory, you can specify the --ledir and --datadir options to indicate the directories in which the server and databases are located on your system. 🫶

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🌈 where do the error messages even go 🌈

When you use mariadbd-safe to start mariadbd, mariadbd-safe arranges for error (and notice) messages from itself and from mariadbd to go to the same destination. matching outfits, basically.

There are several mariadbd-safe options for controlling the destination of these messages:

• --syslog: Write error messages to syslog on systems that support the logger program.
• --skip-syslog: Do not write error messages to syslog. Messages are written to the default error log file (host_name.err in the data directory), or to a named file if the --log-error option is given.
• --log-error=file_name: Write error messages to the named error file.

If none of these options is given, the default is --skip-syslog.

Note 📌 If --syslog and --log-error are both given, a warning is issued and --log-error takes precedence. she said pick one, and she picked --log-error.

When mariadbd-safe writes a message, notices go to the logging destination (syslog or the error log file) and stdout. Errors go to the logging destination and stderr. two places at once, main character energy ✨

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👑 do NOT edit the script, i'm begging 👑

Normally, you should not edit the mariadbd-safe script. instead, configure mariadbd-safe by using command-line options or options in the [mariadbd-safe] section of a my.cnf option file. in rare cases, it might be necessary to edit mariadbd-safe to get it to start the server properly. however — if you do this, your modified version of mariadbd-safe might be overwritten if you upgrade MariaDB in the future, so you should make a copy of your edited version that you can reinstall. protect your edits, they're precious 😭

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🍓 NetWare moment 🍓

On NetWare, mariadbd-safe is a NetWare Loadable Module (NLM) that is ported from the original Unix shell script. It starts the server as follows:

1. Runs a number of system and option checks.
2. Runs a check on MyISAM tables.
3. Provides a screen presence for the MariaDB server.
4. Starts mariadbd, monitors it, and restarts it if it terminates in error.
5. Sends error messages from mariadbd to the host_name.err file in the data directory.
6. Sends mariadbd-safe screen output to the host_name.safe file in the data directory.

💖 COPYRIGHT 💖

So like, the legal bit, bestie — it's giving "the boring part that actually matters", so let's give it the respect it deserves. 🫶

Copyright 2007-2008 MySQL AB, 2008-2010 Sun Microsystems, Inc., 2010-2025 MariaDB Foundation.

This documentation is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it only under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; version 2 of the License.

This documentation is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. 😭 (yes, it's yelling in caps, that's just how licenses are, they're dramatic like that)

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with the program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1335 USA or see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

fr fr, if you didn't get a copy of the GPL with your program, that address and that URL are your moves. not me being your legal bestie but here we are 💅

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🌈 SEE ALSO

For more information, please refer to the MariaDB Documentation, available online at https://mariadb.com/docs/

Like, literally just go read the docs. It's all there. Obsessed. ✨

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👑 AUTHOR

MariaDB Foundation (http://www.mariadb.org/).

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and that's a wrap on the whole page, bestie 🎀 go forth and run your server safely, you absolute icon 🦋

This page is from MariaDB 11.8, dated 5 March 2025, and it's MARIADBD-SAFE(1) — catch you in the next manpage 💜