Unsure of what this means and how to fix it.

Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (2)

Any help please?

I got that error once when my host's sql server was down temporarily. Check if that is the case otherwise:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...=Google+Search

I can logon through phpmyadmin, so it can't be down i guess. And those google results don't really help me, i'm on a shared hosting package you see.

Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (2)

This indicate that the script tries to conenct to a mysql server on a linux server LOCALLY

i'm on a shared hosting package you see.

This tend to indicate that your server is not local, thus the connection error.

Look in your script documentation the connection settings, and accord the target server to the info your host should have given you.
The script is likely to try to connect to "localhost" or "127.0.0.1" (which is the local loopback network interface. It always refer to the computer itself, but through the network stack.)

Not sure what you mean, my host didn't give me any information on MySQL databases.

Here's a php info page

Here's the MySQL Documentation

Sorry, like I said, kinda new with php.

Who is your host with?

The point is, that the PHP script has to know where to connect to a db.
When the script runs on your host server, "localhost" referes to the server itself, which is where the database resides too 99% of time.

But, when you download the files to your computer, or a computer in your local network, the database is not repatriated, so the "localhost" is not the good database server anymore.

That's probably where your error lies.
You can either replace the occurences of "localhost" or "127.0.0.1" in the PHP mysql connect string to the IP of your server.
But it may fail if the mysql server is not configured to allow connection from another address than localhost.

Or you need to get a "dump" of the datas in your database, and to restore them on a mysql instance that will run on the same server as your files are on.
Then, "localhost" will refer a valid instance of the database agin.

Look in your control panel for MySQL databases. Sounds like you may not have created a database on the host. If you have, the control panel will give you the information on connection parameters.

Originally Posted by Gilligan

I can logon through phpmyadmin, so it can't be down i guess. And those google results don't really help me, i'm on a shared hosting package you see.

Its entirely possible that you can have cpanel access and a fully functional site (other than the database problems) and at the same time have the mysql server down. I would if you still haven't figured it out you may want to just contact your host directly about the issue.

Originally Posted by tripy

Or you need to get a "dump" of the datas in your database, and to restore them on a mysql instance that will run on the same server as your files are on.
Then, "localhost" will refer a valid instance of the database agin.

How would I do this, and what is a mysql instance.

My hosts are webfusion, myserverworld.net.

I have contact my host support about the problem

Definitions of instance on the Web:
case: an occurrence of something;
An Oracle Instance is a running Oracle Database made up of memory structures and background processes. An instance only exists while it is up and running. Simply put, a database resides on disk, while an instance resides in memory. ...

By instance, I was referring by a mysql server (the program, not the computer) running on the same computer that the one who have the files on, and with a web server (again, the program, not the hardware) up and running too.

So what exactly should i do, and how?

i changed 'localhost' to 'mysql101' and it worked