At the time of writing, MariaDB 10.1 is the development version of MariaDB. It is based on MariaDB 5.5, and includes back-ported features from MySQL 5.6. There are also new features that are exclusive to MariaDB.

For CentOS, RedHat, and Fedora, it is highly recommended to install from a repository using yum. This guide will walk you through the installation steps for CentOS 6.

Add the MariaDB repository

First, ensure the list of available packages is up-to-date before installing. Open your SSH terminal and input the following commands.

yum -y update

Add the MariaDB repository.

nano /etc/yum.repos.d/MariaDB.repo

For 32-bit users, paste the following text:

[mariadb]
name = MariaDB
baseurl = http://yum.mariadb.org/10.1/centos6-x86
gpgkey=https://yum.mariadb.org/RPM-GPG-KEY-MariaDB
gpgcheck=1

For 64-bit users, paste the following text:

[mariadb]
name = MariaDB
baseurl = http://yum.mariadb.org/10.1/centos6-amd64
gpgkey=https://yum.mariadb.org/RPM-GPG-KEY-MariaDB
gpgcheck=1

Save the MariaDB.repo file.

Install software

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

yum install MariaDB-server MariaDB-client -y

Once the installation completes, start MariaDB.

service mysql start

Next, set MariaDB to start on every boot.

chkconfig mysql on

Secure MariaDB

Secure your MariaDB installation. The following checklist shows the steps that will be performed.

• Set (Change) root password.
• Remove anonymous users.
• Disallow root login remotely.
• Remove test database and access to it.
• Reload privilege tables.

Run the secure installation command.

mysql_secure_installation

Example output

NOTE: RUNNING ALL PARTS OF THIS SCRIPT IS RECOMMENDED FOR ALL MariaDB
SERVERS IN PRODUCTION USE! PLEASE READ EACH STEP CAREFULLY!

In order to log into MariaDB to secure it, we'll need the current
password for the root user. If you've just installed MariaDB, and
you haven't set the root password yet, the password will be blank,
so you should just press enter here.

Enter current password for root (enter for none):
OK, successfully used password, moving on...

Setting the root password ensures that nobody can log into the MariaDB
root user without the proper authorisation.

Set root password? [Y/n] y
New password: ENTER YOUR PASSWORD
Re-enter new password: REPEAT YOUR PASSWORD
Password updated successfully!
Reloading privilege tables..
... Success!

By default, a MariaDB installation has an anonymous user, allowing anyone
to log into MariaDB without having to have a user account created for
them. This is intended only for testing, and to make the installation
go a bit smoother. You should remove them before moving into a
production environment.

Remove anonymous users? [Y/n] y
... Success!

Normally, root should only be allowed to connect from 'localhost'. This
ensures that someone cannot guess at the root password from the network.

Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n] y
... Success!

By default, MariaDB comes with a database named 'test' that anyone can
access. This is also intended only for testing, and should be removed
before moving into a production environment.

Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n] y
- Dropping test database...
... Success!
- Removing privileges on test database...
... Success!

Reloading the privilege tables will ensure that all changes made so far
will take effect immediately.

Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n] y
... Success!

Cleaning up...

All done! If you've completed all of the above steps, your MariaDB
 installation should now be secure.

Thanks for using MariaDB!

Restart MariaDB.

service mysql restart

You can connect to MariaDB by using following command.

mysql -u root -p

Congratulations, you have successfully installed MariaDB on CentOS 6. Enjoy!