I think I've found out what is going on here. If one has mysql-5.7 installed, one needs to run mysql_upgrade plus some extra conversions to get the database in a working state.
I rename the socket auth plugin in https://salsa.debian.org/mariadb-team/mariadb-10.3/commit/15935cff592b8bccecf835ac4322784dd5da3e89 However also upstream mysql_upgrade needs to run as it does the Password column rename in two potential places: - https://github.com/MariaDB/server/blob/10.3/scripts/mysql_to_mariadb.sql - https://github.com/MariaDB/server/blob/10.3/scripts/mysql_system_tables_fix.sql See also https://jira.mariadb.org/browse/MDEV-11170?focusedCommentId=126486&page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels%3Acomment-tabpanel#comment-126486 A manual workaround at the moment is: shell 1$ /usr/bin/mysqld_safe 190417 18:58:17 mysqld_safe Logging to syslog. 190417 18:58:17 mysqld_safe Starting mysqld daemon with databases from /var/lib/mysql shell 2$ /usr/bin/mysqld_safe 190417 18:58:17 mysqld_safe Logging to syslog. 190417 18:58:17 mysqld_safe Starting mysqld daemon with databases from /var/lib/mysql ... After this apt install -f will complete. The above should somehow be incorporated into the mariadb-server-10.3.postinst file.
