getting up and running?!

[soulpatrol]

can anyone help please.

 

i've installed oscommerce to a Linux server and setup a Mysql database, gone through the installation process as far as configuration.

 

i get an error message saying mysql_connect(): Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock' (2)

 

if i upgrade the installation i get the message 'the configutation files do not exist, or permission levels are not set'

 

i've changed permissions locally to 706 and 777 on both admin & shop files and re-uploaded with still no joy.

 

any ideas what's wrong?