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If I convert the database into Unicode, as I understand it, I then have to change the charset on all my dynamically generated html pages to display it correctly in browsers?
But then don't only very recent browsers support Unicode?
ps: I already asked this over on the php forum, but didn't get much response - I'm thinking that over here in Asia, there are probably more people familiar with this question!?
Hopefully others more knowledgeable in this area might be able to help further.
Onya
Woz
You are correct that you would have to change the charset on your pages, but don't forget to also add the language attribute to the code as well. If you add the following two elements to each page you should cover most of the browsers:
<html lang="kr">
...
<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="kr">tedster was mentioning in another recent thread that you can declare the content-language (and character set) in the HTTP server header: How to declare content language [webmasterworld.com]
That might be an option depending on your server setup.
Are you storing Korean data in the MySQL data base?
If you are you must import this data using the correct character set. I recommend using Myphpadmin, select Korean and the correct character set.
Then you need to check to make sure the data is showing correctly in MyphpAdmin. Then you can go on to extract the data into the web pages.
As late as last year I have heard from programmers in Japan and China saying that Unicode was not a good database solution for those languages yet.
um, well what is the alternative?
You are correct that you would have to change the charset on your pages, but don't forget to...
Yes I realize that - I've already created static Japanese-language pages. The problem here is that I must have, in the same database, European and Korean language data. And then I must display data from that mysql db, on web pages.
Again, I know that I can do that, using a unicode mysql database - the question is, when I go to display that information on web-pages, whether that is going to resrict the browsers that can view them, on my European-language sites.
um, well what is the alternative?Well, like whats up skip suggested, use a local charset like x-sjis or EUC-JP for Japanese instead of the UTF-8. The language you upload in is key. If it looks good once you get it on the webserver (MyphpAdmin) you're ok to go.
whether that is going to resrict the browsers that can view them, on my European-language sites.Sounds like a CMS of some sort. Is there any way to have different charsets on the templates? That might help.
If you can get the Korean content up and looking correct with UTF-8, then technically your European content shouldn't be affected at all. You just need to set the correct language tags on the different pages.
Unicode is great when it works. I know that Google Japan and Korea are using it. I just wanted to warn you that some local people still aren't all that convinced it is the best encoding for their languages. They have sited some display problems on different browsers and web enabled devices as their reason for this argument. I haven't quizzed them more deeply for the technical details.
Well, like whats up skip suggested, use a local charset like x-sjis or EUC-JP for Japanese instead of the UTF-8. The language you upload in is key. If it looks good once you get it on the webserver (MyphpAdmin) you're ok to go.
Well, phpMyAdmin is just a php interface that accesses the MySQL database. As I understand it, if we want to store "exotic" characters in MySQL, we must install the db itself as a unicode database.
Unicode is great when it works. ... They have cited some display problems on different browsers
That's precisely what I'm worried about - hm, ...
What you need myphpAdmin (or similar) for; is the importing of the data (say from a text file) to a MySQL data base.
ONLY by selecting Korean or Japanese language interface are you given the corresponding encoding options. These options do not show in English interface.
I never had any sucess using the MySQL ODBC connectors from MS Access to mySQL when using Japanese data. The only other tool I have found that worked well is the Navicat product, but you need the 6.1 beta or later version for full support of Japanese encoding from MS Access.
