I tried MacPorts to no avail. MAMP is installed and I like their disclaimer that the uninstall is a simple matter of deleting the folder. Thanks for the guidance. I will play around with config individual pieces in the safety of a linux VM, a good sand box.

It did help, I was hoping for a little more input. Maybe I should I have put the topic in MySQL.

Lemur,
Hate was a strong word, maybe painful learning experience better describes it. I see your point. It is solid and dependable, just not a friendly desktop app. And one term working in it was not really enough.

baavgai, Makes perfect sense, the class linux whiz kid agrees with you that the above cmd is incorrect. That said the teacher did it the way I wrote. She is flexible so I will send this along to her. On a separate but related note, that was the last time I have to open up a Solaris VM. I hate it. I am happy with Mac and linux.
thanks,
diek

uncompress -v home.tar.Z | tar -xvf home.tar
Did the job, I agree with you guys compress is not the way to go.