Can't connect to port-forwarded Pod running MySQL - mysql

Question

I have the following deployment which puts up MySQL instance:
kind: Deployment
apiVersion: apps/v1beta1
metadata:
name: mysql
spec:
replicas: 1
template:
metadata:
labels:
app: mysql
spec:
containers:
- name: mysql
image: mysql:8
ports:
- containerPort: 3306
env:
- name: MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD
valueFrom:
secretKeyRef:
name: mysql-root-password
key: password
The password is just root :
kind: Secret
apiVersion: v1
metadata:
name: mysql-root-password
type: Opaque
data:
password: cm9vdA==
The problem is I try to connect to the instance after port forwarding the MySQL port, following the instructions from here, but get an error:
$ kubectl port-forward mysql-824284009-rpbpk 3306
Forwarding from 127.0.0.1:3306 -> 3306
Forwarding from [::1]:3306 -> 3306
# from another terminal
$ mysql -u root -p
Enter password:
ERROR 2002 (HY000): Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/run/mysqld/mysqld.sock' (2)
Connecting to the server from the pod itself works:
$ kubectl exec -it mysql-824284009-rpbpk -- /bin/bash
root#mysql-824284009-rpbpk:/# mysql -u root -p
Enter password:
Welcome to the MySQL monitor. Commands end with ; or \g.
...
mysql>
I have basically the same setup like here, except I'm running the cluster in minikube instead of GCP.
My local MySQL is not runnning, so I assume there is no chance of clashing.

Answer 1

The port forwarding is likely there, but you need to tell mysql client to connect using host/port and not unix socket (default)
mysql --host=localhost --protocol tcp --port=3306 -u root -p
If you don't, mysql by default uses local linux socket to connect to he server: /var/run/mysqld/mysqld.sock .. It even tells you so ;)
Update: As Gabriel checked - adding --protocol tcp had finally made it works, so I am addding it to my answer