How to Diagnose Losing Characters , Getting "Funny" Output When Inserting or Selecting Other Than A-Z,a-z ( = Non English Data Like Chinese, Russian, Hebrew , Insert Any Language Here to the List That is Not English) in/from CHAR, VARCHAR2, LONG or CLOB
(Doc ID 1628060.1)
Last updated on DECEMBER 28, 2023
Applies to:
Oracle Database - Enterprise Edition - Version 9.0.1.0 and laterOracle Database - Standard Edition - Version 9.0.1.0 and later
Oracle Database Cloud Schema Service - Version N/A and later
Oracle Database Exadata Cloud Machine - Version N/A and later
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure - Database Service - Version N/A and later
Information in this document applies to any platform.
NOTE: In the images and/or the document content below, the user information and environment data used
represents fictitious data from the Oracle sample or bulit-in schema(s), Public Documentation delivered
with an Oracle database product or other training material. Any similarity to actual environments,
actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended in any manner.
Symptoms
Trying to select from or insert in CHAR, VARCHAR2, LONG or CLOB datatypes other than A-Z,a-z data ( = non English data like Chinese, French, Russian, Hebrew , insert any language here to the list that is not English or "special characters" like the € symbol) and the result is
- or some form of a question mark like ? , ¿ or �.
- or the data shows up as "funny" characters for example ¯°±²³´µ¶·¹ instead of the expected data.
Changes
Changes can be many, new client installation, new database installation or simply trying to use a not used language before in an existing system with "normal" CHAR, VARCHAR2, LONG or CLOB column types.
This note provides a step by step approach to find out where the problem is and then how to correct it.
Cause
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In this Document
| Symptoms |
| Changes |
| Cause |
| Solution |
| A) Install Oracle SQLdeveloper 4 (or 3) on an windows client (preferably Microsoft Windows 7 or higher) |
| B) Confirm this Microsoft Windows client used for Oracle Sqldeveloper can display the language you want to check/see and has the needed OS support and fonts. |
| B.1) check if there is need to add support to Microsoft Windows Operating System for the language(s) that are used . |
| B.2) check if the Microsoft Windows has Unicode fonts installed that define the language(s) that are used . |
| C) If point B) is fine then confirm that the Oracle SQLdeveloper interface can handle the language(s) you want to check. |
| D) If point C) is fine then use Oracle SQLdeveloper to check that the database is able to store the characters/language you want to use. |
| F) If point E) is fine then check the configuration of the selecting tool / application. |
| References |