How to change the encoding of MySQL

With the development of the times, applications need to be more versatile and global. Supporting multiple languages ​​​​such as Chinese, Japanese, and German has become a standard feature of modern applications. However, although it has become common for applications to support multiple languages, there are still many application developers who do not realize that encoding is a very important issue in database storage.

In MySQL, encoding refers to which character set is used to store information. If the settings are incorrect, data will not be stored or retrieved correctly. This will cause many problems, including garbled characters, data loss, data inconsistency, etc.

If you encounter encoding problems when using MySQL, then this article will help you solve the problem. Next, we'll explore how to change MySQL's encoding.

1. Understand MySQL encoding

In MySQL, encoding refers to which character set is used to store and retrieve data. MySQL supports multiple encodings, including UTF-8, GB2312, GBK, BIG5, etc. When creating databases and tables in MySQL, you need to specify the encoding.

The following are some of the encodings supported by MySQL:

UTF-8: This is the most widely used encoding in MySQL and supports multiple languages ​​and character sets.

GB2312: This is the simplified Chinese encoding commonly used in MySQL.

GBK: This is the Chinese encoding commonly used in MySQL, supporting Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese.

BIG5: This is the Traditional Chinese encoding commonly used in MySQL.

2. Change MySQL encoding

If you use the wrong encoding in MySQL, you may encounter problems such as data corruption, character encoding errors, garbled characters, etc. Therefore, it is very important to change the encoding of MySQL.

Here are the steps to change the MySQL encoding:

Step 1: Back up your data

Be sure to back up your data before changing the MySQL encoding. If you make a mistake when changing the encoding, you can restore your data.

Step 2: Change the my.cnf file

The my.cnf file is the configuration file of MySQL. You can change the encoding of MySQL by changing this file.

Before changing the my.cnf file, you should determine the correct encoding. You can use the following command to view the current encoding:

sudo vi /etc/my.cnf

Add the following code under [mysqld] to change the encoding of MySQL:

[mysqld]
character_set_server=Encoding name
collation-server=Encoding name

For example, if you want to change the MySQL encoding to UTF-8, use the following code:

[mysqld]
character_set_server=utf8
collation-server=utf8_general_ci

Step 3: Restart MySQL

After changing the my.cnf file, you need to restart MySQL for the changes to take effect. You can restart MySQL using the following command:

sudo systemctl restart mysqld.service

After restarting MySQL, your data will use the new encoding.

3. Summary

In modern applications, supporting multiple languages ​​has become standard. However, setting the correct encoding in MySQL is still an easily overlooked issue. If you encounter encoding issues when using MySQL, be sure to change the encoding to the correct one. This will help you avoid various data problems.

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