SOLVED: Mojibake Encoding Issues & Charset Fix In SQL Server 2017
Have you ever encountered a web page or application where text appears as a jumbled mess of symbols, seemingly random characters, and unrecognizable glyphs? This phenomenon, often referred to as "mojibake," is a surprisingly common issue, stemming from mismatches in character encoding and can render content completely unreadable.
The root of the problem lies in how computers store and interpret text. Characters are not directly represented as they appear on screen; instead, they are encoded using numerical values. These values are then translated into the visual representation we see. When the system interpreting the text uses a different encoding than the one used to store the text, the result is mojibake. This can occur at various points in the data lifecycle, from the database to the web server and finally to the user's browser.
Let's consider a hypothetical scenario. Imagine a content management system (CMS) storing data in SQL Server 2017, with the default collation set to `sql_latin1_general_cp1_ci_as`. This collation, while widely used, may not fully support all character sets, especially those outside of Western European languages. Data is often entered from various sources, potentially using different character encodings, like UTF-8, a more comprehensive and modern standard. If the database is not properly configured to handle this, the incoming data can be misinterpreted, leading to encoding errors.
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Here's an example, the original chinese characters which are displayed in a web page, may be displayed as:
- \u00c3\u00a4\u00e2\u00b8\u00e2\u00ad`\u00e3\u00a5\u00e2\u20ac\u00ba\u00e2\u00bd\u00e3\u00a6\u00e2\u00b6\u00e2\u00b2\u00e3\u00a5\u00e5\u2019\u00e2\u20ac\u201c\u00e3\u00a5\u00e2\u00a4\u00e2\u00a9\u00e3\u00a7\u00e2\u20ac\u017e\u00e2\u00b6\u00e3\u00a6\u00e2\u00b0\u00e2\u20ac\u00e3\u00a8\u00e2\u00bf\u00e2\u00e3\u00a8\u00e2\u00be\u00e2\u20ac\u0153\u00e3\u00af\u00e2\u00bc\u00eb\u2020\u00e3\u00a6\u00e5\u00bd\u00e2\u00a7\u00e3\u00a8\u00e2\u20ac\u0161\u00e2\u00a1\u00e3\u00af\u00e2\u00bc\u00e2\u20ac\u00b0\u00e3\u00a6\u00e5\u201c\u00e2\u20ac\u00b0\u00e3\u00a9\u00e2\u201e\u00a2\u00e2\u00e3\u00a5\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6\u00e2\u00ac\u00e3\u00a5\u00e2\u00e2\u00b8\u00e3\u00a6\u00e5\u00bd\u00e2\u00a7\u00e3\u00a8\u00e2\u20ac\u0161\u00e2\u00a1`
Let's delve into some other cases. Consider the specific characters appearing in mojibake:
- U+00bf \u00bf \u00e2\u00bf inverted question mark
- \u00c3 latin capital letter a with grave
- \u00c3 latin capital letter a with acute
- \u00c3 latin capital letter a with circumflex
- \u00c3 latin capital letter a with tilde
The issue isn't limited to web pages; it can also affect data files. Suppose you are working with a CSV file generated from a data server through an API. If the API is not configured to correctly handle the character encoding of the data, when it is saved, it may not display the proper characters.
One user reported a severely garbled MySQL table, where characters like "" and "" were converted into completely unrecognizable sequences of characters. The user needed to convert the table, employing the correct query to fix encoding.
In cases where the frontend and the database do not agree on the encoding, the results can be confusing. Take, for instance, the appearance of \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc and \u00e2. These characters are not expected to be present in normal text but are a clear signal of character encoding mismatch.
The solution often involves setting the correct charset, primarily UTF-8, across all components of the system. This encompasses the database, the web server, the HTML pages, and the connections between them. Moreover, for broader support and to accommodate a wider range of characters, especially in languages like Chinese or those using special characters, using UTF-8 with the `utf8mb4` character set is essential in tables and connections.
Here is a table that explains some commonly seen mojibake characters with their intended characters:
| Mojibake Character | Intended Character | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| \u00c3\u00a4 | This is a combination of the Latin letter 'a' with the umlaut diacritic (). The two characters have become two seperate codes due to encoding issues. | |
| \u00c3\u00a9 | The combination of Latin letter 'e' with an acute accent, the code has been converted to \u00c3 due to encoding issues. | |
| \u00c2\u20ac\u0153 | This is a smart double quotation mark. Encoding errors cause the system to read this single symbol as a series of symbols. | |
| \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc | ' | Single quotation marks can also be subject to this kind of encoding issue. |
| \u00e2 | N/A | This frequently appears as a result of double-encoding, where a character is already encoded but then re-encoded. |
