Why can't I create my database using "rake db:create"?

Question

I've recently started reading up on Rails and while getting my development environment ready on Windows, I kept running into problems. So I opted to just work on the server space I have with asmallorange.com.

Everything went smoothly until I tried created my database.

When running

rake db:create

I get a response saying that it could not create a database. There is no relevant error with the response and there's no errors in the log files. My PuTTY session looks like this:

[~]# cd alist
[~/alist]# rake db:create
(in /home/jonnie/alist)
Couldn't create database for {"socket"=>"/var/lib/mysql/mysqld.sock", "reconnect"=>false, "encoding"=>"utf8", "username"=>"admin", "adapter"=>"mysql", "password"=>"************", "database"=>"alist_development", "pool"=>5}, charset: utf8, collation: utf8_general_ci (if you set the charset manually, make sure you have a matching collation)

And my database.yml file looks like this:

development:
  adapter: mysql
  encoding: utf8
  reconnect: false
  database: alist_development
  pool: 5
  username: admin
  password: ************
  socket: /var/lib/mysql/mysqld.sock

test:
  adapter: mysql
  encoding: utf8
  reconnect: false
  database: alist_test
  pool: 5
  username: admin
  password: ************
  socket: /var/lib/mysql/mysqld.sock

production:
  adapter: mysql
  encoding: utf8
  reconnect: false
  database: alist_production
  pool: 5
  username: admin
  password: ************
  socket: /var/lib/mysql/mysqld.sock

I'm pretty stuck at this point, and I haven't been able to find an answer anywhere else. Anyone know what's up? Is there something I'm doing wrong or should I contact my host with the problem?

Answer 1

Probably the user you have on your hosting doesn't have the privileges to create databases...maybe you will have to create the database from hosting tools (from cpanel, for example).

Answer 2

Also, are you sure /var/lib/mysql/mysqld.sock is the proper place for the socket? It might be that the mysql installation is configured for putting sockets in /tmp or somewhere else.