Questions about MariaDB compatibility.

[Silvertree]

I used XAMPP a long time ago. In 2001 I was building a story archive for a writer's group I was a member of. I discovered XAMPP while getting the project together, used it to create my development system, and updated it in 2008 when I got a new computer. A few years ago I took the archive off line for lack of interest. Since then, the group has come back to life. I am attempting to put the archive back on line. I just had a week of hassle trying to get Apache to work and it is beyond me to put development system together. I had though that XAMPP was only for Windows, and I now use Linux Mint 19.3. I decided I should look to see if XAMPP was available for Linux. Thankfully it is. Last time I just installed it and was using it quickly with little hassle. I do have some questions.

Is the MariaDB fully compatible with MYSQL? I have the last MYSQL dump from my host that contains all our old writing. I assume that whatever host I decide to use will be using MYSQL. Will my MYSQL dump of the old writing be uploadable to the host? Will MariaDB work with software written to use MYSQL?

I also have a question about the current install of Apache2/PHP/MYSQL on my Linux Mint 19.3 machine. In the software manager, there is a button to uninstall Apache. Does anyone know what else I should uninstall? Is it better to do a clean install of Linux Mint?

Thanks in advance for answering.

[Altrea]

Is the MariaDB fully compatible with MYSQL?

Generally speaking: yes. You can expect that all the heavily used MySQL functions are working the same way in MariaDB too.
Of cause there are some differences. But to answer if your specific application will run flawlessly is impossible.
There are a bunch of informations about the differences here: https://mariadb.com/kb/en/mariadb-vs-mysql-features/

[Silvertree]

Thanks. That is a major resource. I only discovered that MariaDB was a thing a few hours ago.

Just scanning a few of the entries there, it looks like the differences are commands I didn't use. My big worry was select statements, because a story archive with blog and forum has countless select statements, and it has been a decade since I looked at the code.