To properly explain why MySQL is dead:

    https://optimizedbyotto.com/post/reasons-to-stop-using-mysql/

Effectively, all opensource development on MySQL has stopped. That is why it is
no longer present in debian's repos.

Cheers

On Tue, 20 Jan 2026, Marc Shapiro via Dng wrote:

>I haven't done any database stuff in quite a while, and I was looking
>at MySQL.
>
>I found default-mysql-server, which depends on mariadb-server-compat,
>which depends on mariadb-server.
>
>Running mysqladmin ping returns:
>
>'mysqld is alive'
>
>
>Running mysqladmin version returns:
>
>mysqladmin from 11.8.3-MariaDB, client 10.0 for debian-linux-gnu (x86_64)
>Copyright (c) 2000, 2018, Oracle, MariaDB Corporation Ab and others.
>
>Server version        11.8.3-MariaDB-0+deb13u1 from Debian
>Protocol version    10
>Connection        Localhost via UNIX socket
>UNIX socket        /run/mysqld/mysqld.sock
>Uptime:            12 hours 1 min 58 sec
>
>So, is mariadb what is actually running, with a compatibility layer to
>allow mysql commands?  If so, then I would assume that I can treat the
>installation as either mysql, or mariadb.  Is this correct?  Is there
>any reason to treat it as one, or the other?
>
>Marc
>