Is Mysql correctly installed? Is it running? Is your username registered and granted access? Is it on port 3306? When you installed DBD did the tests work? You can check by trying to connect with the client mysql or the admin program mysqladmin, or by calling the boot script ("/etc/rc.d/init.d/mysql status" on my machine). I'd first check these out before trying to connect from Perl. That error message is wierd too, it seems to refer to a static html file.