I know this has been reported before but my situation is different. really...

I don't have mysql installed, so why should httpd be reporting this? I did find a copy of /etc/my.cnf, which is odd, so I tried moving it to /tmp but that didn't help either.

Any and all suggestions will be appreciated.

-mark

someone just pointed out that ganglia is running on this server and it has its own webserver. maybe that's part of the problem?
-mark

While you may not have mysql installed, it looks like the web page you are trying to access is attempting to connect to a mysql database, most likely on the localhost.

The message you describe is usually caused when a page coded for mysql wants to access a mysql database and it is not running. On Linux, you can connect to mysql either through a TCP/IP port or by using a Unix socket. Sockets are used when localhost is specified or when connecting to a server on the same computer.

I'd start by seeing if a simple html page works without error. If not, then we'll have to dig deeper.