This is just a note to help out anyone that might want to use the mysql_config_editor command in their automation tools. 

the mysql_config_editor does not take a password argument so automation tools that might have before set your password in the .my.cnf file trying to use mysql_config_editor fails. 

It is possible and quite simple though with the expect tool. 

 yum -y install expect  

it works for apt-get also. 

So in this example, I will show a simple bash script version. 

1st.. my login path does not work... 

mysql --login-path=local

ERROR 1045 (28000): Access denied for user

Set this with expect 

You would execute this via your bash script.  

expect <<EOD

spawn mysql_config_editor set --login-path=local --host=localhost --user=root --password 

expect "password"

send  -- "<PASSWORD>\r"

interact

EOD

Now it works...

mysql --login-path=local

Welcome to the MySQL monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.

Your MySQL connection id is 1002