Error: F_JD21AE: Plugin caching_sha2_password Could Not Be Loaded

Issue

While connecting to a MySQL 8 database location, the following error appears:

F_JD21AE: Unable to connect to MySQL database 'database' on node 'node'. Plugin caching_sha2_password could notbe loaded: The specified module could not be found. Library path is caching_sha2_password.dll

Environment

• HVR 5
• HVR 6
• Source: MySQL 8

Resolution

To resolve this issue, contact your database administrator to change the default authentication plugin for your MySQL database from caching_sha2_password to mysql_native_password.

Cause

We use the mysql_native_password plugin to authenticate MySQL database connections. However, MySQL 8 and later versions use the caching_sha2_password plugin by default. As a result, this issue occurs when we attempt to establish a connection to a MySQL 8 database using the mysql_native_password plugin which isn't available.