MySQL ERROR! The server quit without updating PID file

ERROR! The server quit without updating PID file

You may face this error while restarting MySQL service.

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root@ [~]# /etc/init.d/mysql status
ERROR! MySQL is not running, but lock file (/var/lock/subsys/mysql) exists
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If you are facing the above error just remove the MySQL lock file and restart the server. May be while restarting the service you will get the pid error.

root@ [~]# rm /var/lock/subsys/mysql
rm: remove regular empty file `/var/lock/subsys/mysql’? y

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root@ [~]# /etc/init.d/mysql restart
ERROR! MySQL server PID file could not be found!
Starting MySQL… ERROR! The server quit without updating PID file (/var/lib/mysql/hostname.pid).
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In this case check the MySQL process and kill it. In this case there is no more MySQL process, so I need to check the MySQL log.

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root@ [~]# ps aux | grep mysql
root 32616 0.0 0.0 107412 864 pts/3 S+ 11:14 0:00 grep mysql
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If the issue still persist please check the MySQL log may be there is any incorrect entry on my.cnf file.

Sample log
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130728 11:23:45 [ERROR] /usr/sbin/mysqld: unknown variable ‘set-variable=max_user_connections=50?
130728 11:23:45 [ERROR] Aborting

130728 11:23:45 InnoDB: Starting shutdown…
130728 11:23:45 InnoDB: Shutdown completed; log sequence number 2153996
130728 11:23:45 [Note] /usr/sbin/mysqld: Shutdown complete

130728 11:23:45 mysqld_safe mysqld from pid file /var/lib/mysql/hostname.pid ended
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Edit the my.cnf file and #hash the enrty then start the MySQL.

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root@ [~]# /etc/init.d/mysql start
Starting MySQL.. SUCCESS!
root@ [~]#