Read utf-8 from DataBase

[mstachu]

Hello,

I my database (MySQL) I have names of the european cities ex. Wrocław. Whan I read it with code :

	public List<CityDO> getCityList(Integer countryId) throws Exception {
		StringBuffer sb=new StringBuffer();
		sb.append("SELECT ");
		sb.append("idcity, ");
		sb.append("name ");
		sb.append("FROM ");
		sb.append("city ");
		sb.append("WHERE ");
		sb.append("idcountry =").append(countryId);
	    
		System.out.println("Query :"+sb.toString());

		DBInterface db=DBInterface.getInstance();		
		DataSource ds=db.getJdbcTemplate().getDataSource();
        System.out.println("DB:"+ds+"        "+ds.getConnection());
		CityQuery pq = new CityQuery(ds,sb.toString());
		List<CityDO> result=pq.execute();

        return result;		
    }

I get crappy characters : Wrocław.


I have transformed my DB table to support UTF-8, but I don't know why it doesn't work.

Any ideas ?

[gmatthews]

Try displaying the characters in a browser page.

Not sure printing them to the console will work.

[mstachu]

I have done it. I am displaying the result of query in select list, but the result is the same. I also made sure my browser supports UTF-8 characters.

any other ideas ?

Regards

[carlosroman101]

Are you sure that the data in the table your trying to get isn't in a different encoding? I had a similar problem before where I was entering data into the database but when it came back it wasn't UTF8. The problem was due to the fact the data I was entering was being entered in the database as 8859-1.

Try converting the text you get from the database into UTF8 and see if that works. Can't remember where I got this from but it helped with the converting of the text.

    public static String toUTF8(String isoString) {
        String utf8String;
        if (StringUtils.isNotBlank(isoString)) {
            try {
                byte[] stringBytesISO = isoString.getBytes("ISO-8859-1");
                utf8String = new String(stringBytesISO, "UTF-8");
            }
            catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
                // As we can't translate just send back the best guess.
                log.error("UnsupportedEncodingException is: {}", e);
                utf8String = isoString;
            }
        } else {
            utf8String = isoString;
        }
        return utf8String;
    }

[gmatthews]

Couple of gotchas to check for.

1. Make sure you're setting the charset encoding in your page. Probably easiest done with org.springframework.web.filter.CharacterEncodingFi lter and using an init-param of encoding=UTF-8

2. Avoid raw InputStream and OutputStream usage. Use InputStreamReader and OutputStreamWriter if you must.

3. Seemed to be the case but not sure now...use <spring:message> in favour of <c:out>, since <c:out> seems to message up encoding. otherwise just use JSP 2.0 ${someproperty} notation.

How are you building your select list?

[mstachu]

I will try tonight. I have feeling that it will work otherwise I will be back on the forum. My select list is build dynamiclly by DWR (addOptions function.)
Thank for your input.

Michal