Thanks for that. It got me past the install problem. BTW my problem was I had outdated sources.list file. So I backed up my ~/.configcqrlog directory, removed the mysql packages (and it removed cqrlog also). Then I fixed my sources.list to point to the correct ppa and I installed cqrlog successfully. Then I restored my cqrlog directory to ~/.config.

Now cqrlog starts successfully, but it does not find the existing log. It gives me the error "Application.HandleException List index (0) out of bounds", apparently because there is no llog file in the list. If I create a new empty one, cqrlog can use it successfully. SO there is some problem usi9ng the restored database.

This is what I see on the console when I start cqrlog with --DEBUG=1

*
User home directory: /home/mal/
Program home directory: /home/mal/.config/cqrlog/
Data directory: /home/mal/.config/cqrlog/database/
Memebers directory: /home/mal/.config/cqrlog/members/
ZIP code directory: /usr/share/cqrlog/zipcodes/
Binary dir: /usr/bin/
Share dir: /usr/share/cqrlog/
TConnection to MySQL: 5.7
*
*
56 us states loaded
/usr/sbin/mysqld --defaults-file=/home/mal/.config/cqrlog/database/mysql.cnf --datadir=/home/mal/.config/cqrlog/database/ --socket=/home/mal/.config/cqrlog/database/sock --port=64000
2019-02-04 19:17:09 140704054209664 [Note] /usr/sbin/mysqld (mysqld 10.1.34-MariaDB-0ubuntu0.18.04.1) starting as process 30515 ...
select * from tables where table_schema = 'cqrlog_common'

CREATE DATABASE cqrlog_common DEFAULT CHARACTER SET = utf8 DEFAULT COLLATE = utf8_bin;

USE cqrlog_common;

CREATE TABLE bands (
id_bands INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
band VARCHAR(10) DEFAULT '',
b_begin NUMERIC(10,4),
b_end NUMERIC(10,4),
cw NUMERIC(10,4),
rtty NUMERIC(10,4),
ssb NUMERIC(10,4),
rx_offset numeric(10,4) default 0,
tx_offset numeric(10,4) default 0
);
CREATE INDEX band ON bands(band);

CREATE TABLE dxclusters (
id_dxclusters INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
description VARCHAR(100) DEFAULT '',
address VARCHAR(100) DEFAULT '',
port VARCHAR(10) DEFAULT '',
dxcuser VARCHAR(12) DEFAULT '',
dxcpass VARCHAR(20) DEFAULT ''
);
CREATE INDEX description ON dxclusters(description);

CREATE TABLE iota_list (
id_iota_list INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
iota_nr VARCHAR(6) DEFAULT '',
island_name VARCHAR(250) DEFAULT '',
dxcc_ref VARCHAR(15) DEFAULT '',
pref VARCHAR(15) DEFAULT ''
);
CREATE INDEX iota_nr ON iota_list(iota_nr);
CREATE INDEX pref ON iota_list(pref);

CREATE TABLE dxcc_ref (
id_dxcc_ref INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
pref VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL,
name VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
cont VARCHAR(6) NOT NULL,
utc VARCHAR(12)NOT NULL,
lat VARCHAR(10) NOT NULL,
longit VARCHAR(10) NOT NULL,
itu VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL,
waz VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL,
adif SMALLINT NOT NULL DEFAULT 0,
deleted SMALLINT NOT NULL DEFAULT 0
);
CREATE INDEX pref ON dxcc_ref(pref);
CREATE INDEX adif ON dxcc_ref(adif);

CREATE TABLE qslmgr (
id_qslmgr INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
callsign VARCHAR(20),
qsl_via VARCHAR(20),
fromdate DATE
);
CREATE INDEX callsign ON qslmgr(callsign);
CREATE INDEX fromdate ON qslmgr(fromdate);

CREATE TABLE log_list (
id_log_list INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
log_nr SMALLINT NOT NULL,
log_name VARCHAR(50) DEFAULT '',
auto_open SMALLINT NOT NULL DEFAULT 0
);
CREATE INDEX log_nr ON log_list(log_nr);

CREATE TABLE db_version
(
nr SMALLINT NOT NULL
);

TApplication.HandleException TMySQL57Connection : Error executing query: Can't create database 'cqrlog_common' (errno: 2 "No such file or directory")
Stack trace:
$000000000091B09F
$000000000091C788
$00000000006CA63A
$00000000006CAE83
$00000000005AE435
$000000000080E3E9
$0000000000740123
$00007F7B551A2C73