I'm a total Linux noob, trying to set up a LAMP server. Whats the best approach to install MySQL? How do I figure out what files I need? I have installed Apache and PHP using rpm files, but with the couple of rpm files I tried for MySQL I just got a stack of dependency errors. If I try and install a version of MySQL thats old enough will I get less or no dependency errors?
Also, do I need just the one rpm file to make use of MySQL or do I need to install server and client files on my server seperately?
Thanks for your patience

OK - made some progress using up2date - I now have LAMP Now the issue I have is trying to install some PEAR modules

# pear install -f Net_Socket Net_IMAP Log Mail Mail_Mime File Date Console_Getopt DB HTTP_Request
downloading Net_Socket-1.0.8.tgz ...
Starting to download Net_Socket-1.0.8.tgz (5,441 bytes)
.....done: 5,441 bytes
No handlers for package.xml version 2.0

Any ideas

Probably not exactly what you are looking for, but xampp will install a self contained MySQL, php, Apache suite and some more - recommended for development but not for production. It will get you up and running very quickly and is certainly well worth a look see. It will give you various httpacces.cnf (?) files etc that you can certainly use to see what is needed to customise your own installation. A good starting point I think you will agree. When you feel it's time to move on and install everything through your own distro's packages then just recursively delete the /opt/lampp/
It's a good package to play around with and you can always unload your database and re-load it into a subsequent production environment should you decide to. Well worth a look even if it doesn't quite solve your immediate problems.
I appreciate that you may also be constrained by commercial or other factors.

PAix

I tried out xampp before for another project and didn't think of looking at the config files from that. Good pointer! Thanks.