MySQL port open in Leopard firewall (and in ipfw) but can't access

Question

Hi There,
I'm trying to allow MySQL access to a Mac Mini dev server I've setup using MAMP Pro. I've installed OS 10.5 server because I couldn't open a port manually using the Terminal under a Snow Leopard client install.
*MAMP Pro:*
- "Allow local access only" is unticked under MySQL
*Leopard Server Admin:*
- MySQL port 3306 is open for "any"
- I can also see it's open if I run this from the terminal "$ sudo ipfw list"
*Querious Database App:*
- If I try to connect to the database from a client machine using Querious via 3306 or tunnel via ssh I can't connect
*Network Utility:*
- If I do a port scan from my client machine no ports are open on the Mac Mini
*Other info:*
- Stealth mode is off
- The Firewall is the only service which is running in Server Admin
- I can connect via ssh/terminal from this same client machine
- I'm just trying to connect on a local network (so not through a router etc)
Obviously I thought this would be much simpler than it is! Are there other things that need to be configured - do I have to forward the port onto MAMP Pro somehow?
Not sure how it all works sorry so any help would be much appreciated.
Cheers
Ben

Answer 1

Hi Ben,
I have done some brief digging on MAMP and it would appear that you're trying to override the inherent features in OS X Server by using MAMP instead. Apache, MySQL and PHP are all inherent parts of OS X Server, minus the unified interface of MAMP. (phpMyAdmin is open-source and can be installed independently.) This may have been necessary on a non-server (client) version of OS X, but not for Server. As Harry pointed out, removing those elements from OS X Server are not simple tasks and you would be far better off using the built-in versions over trying to bypass them to run MAMP.
3306 is the default port for MySQL, so your pings are reaching the mysql service. You may run into the same problem as I did when trying to establish external connections to mysql from anywhere other than on the host machine (whether that be across a LAN or via the Internet though PHP commands to the mysql service) since requests from anything other than the localhost will be rejected. Working around that with MAMP is not well documented. phpMyAdmin doesn't get under the hood to make the changes needed to allow requests from other hosts.
The MAMP documentation is also lacking on how one can get under the hood of its mysql service, other than that you can access it through Terminal at:
/Applications/MAMP/Library/bin/mysql
in which case all normal mysql commands should work when working in that directory:
+/Applications/MAMP/Library/bin/mysql --host=localhost -uroot -proot+
All in all, though, I think it would be far easier to use the built-in versions. OS X Server is configured to work with what is already there and Apple's support documentation is built around that. Trying to get MAMP working means that you're pretty much on your own trying to figure out the whats, hows and whys when things aren't working. The Server Admin application gives you access to all those services (at least at a base level, excluding phpMyAdmin).
For 10.5 Server, the built-in version of MySQL is 5.0.91; PHP version is 5.2.14; Apache version is 2.2.14, all of which are mostly-current, stable releases.
I don't have any /mysql/msql directories inside the /var/ directory.
That is really odd, as they should be there for an installation of Server.
-Doug