Edit Report a Bug

    mysql_client_encoding

    (PHP 4 >= 4.3.0, PHP 5)

    mysql_client_encoding — Returns the name of the character set

    Warning

    This extension was deprecated in PHP 5.5.0, and it was removed in PHP 7.0.0. Instead, the MySQLi or PDO_MySQL extension should be used. See also MySQL: choosing an API guide. Alternatives to this function include:

    Description

    mysql_client_encoding(resource $link_identifier = NULL): string

    Retrieves the character_set variable from MySQL.

    Parameters

    link_identifier

    The MySQL connection. If the link identifier is not specified, the last link opened by mysql_connect() is assumed. If no such link is found, it will try to create one as if mysql_connect() had been called with no arguments. If no connection is found or established, an E_WARNING level error is generated.

    Return Values

    Returns the default character set name for the current connection.

    Examples

    Example #1 mysql_client_encoding() example

    <?php
    $link     = mysql_connect('localhost', 'mysql_user', 'mysql_password');
    $charset = mysql_client_encoding($link);

    echo     "The current character set is: $charset\n";
    ?>

    The above example will output something similar to:

    The current character set is: latin1

    See Also

    add a note add a note

    User Contributed Notes 13 notes

    up
    1
    Wio at psitrax dot de
    18 years ago
    If you set the encoding in my.cnf like

    [mysqld]
    init_connect='SET NAMES utf8'

    note that the content of init_connect  is not executed for users that have the SUPER privilege - ie root!
    up
    1
    roy dot the dot geek+php at gmail dot com
    17 years ago
    f you think "set names utf8" for each connection is too trouble, you can modify my.cnf of MySQL to solve the problem forever. In my.cnf, add the line "default-character-set=utf8" in both [mysqld] and [client] sections:

    [client]
    default-character-set=utf8

    [mysqld]
    default-character-set=utf8

    The MySQL will use utf8 after you restart it.
    up
    1
    romain at dardour dot com
    18 years ago
    I couldn't get any luck with all the stuff mentioned below, and despite having an unicode DB, and setting all my field to utf8_general_ci...
    After looking around, I found that this page: http://dev.mysql.com/tech-resources/articles/4.1/unicode.html was adding the fields with an extra info before each value:

    <?
    mysql_query    ("INSERT INTO table SET field = _utf8'value'");
    ?>
    Mind the "_utf8" before the field value, and outside of the quotes.

    This works for me wether in an Insert or an Update statement.

    No need here for a <? mysql_query("SET NAMES utf8"); ?> before each query, or to change anything in the config files (that was important since I don't have access to these).
    up
    -1
    info at jantichy dot cz
    19 years ago
    Notice the difference between following two SQL statements:

    SET NAMES 'charset_name'
    SET CHARACTER SET charset_name

    For more detail see
    http://dev.mysql.com/doc/mysql/en/Charset-connection.html
    up
    -1
    Pedro Pereira
    18 years ago
    All I had to do to save utf8 data with php mysql_query() was to go to the php.ini and put default_charset = "utf-8". Without this I had the same problems some of you have. Plus, all my mysql charsets vars are in 'utf8'. (Changed them with Mysql Admin Tool)

    Didnt use any mysql SET **** command at all.

    Mysql 4.1.20
    PHP 4.4.4
    Win XP

    Hope this help some of you.
    up
    -1
    zayfod at yahoo dot com
    18 years ago
    The right lines to put in /etc/my.cnf (or other MySQL options file) are:

    [client]
    init-command="SET NAMES utf8"

    Unfortuantely the PHP mysql_connect() function does not use MySQL options files so this is not a sollution for changing the default connection character set for mysqlclient library v4.1+.

    The only working sollution remains:

    mysql_query("SET NAMES utf8", $conn);

    (of course /ext/mysql/php_mysql.c can always be patched ;] )
    up
    -1
    alamakota at mises dot pl
    18 years ago
    There's no 'character_set' variable available in MySQL. You can check it yourself in MySQL online documentation or by running MySQL query "SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'character_set%';".
    This must be an error in PHP manual, unless I'm missing something.
    up
    -2
    php at quarkus dot de
    17 years ago
    Please note that even if you set the charset by issuing the two mentioned SQL statements (set names, set character set) mysql_client_encoding still deliveres the old result.

    Default for me is latin1. After switching to UTF8 mysql_client_encoding still returns latin1. The charset switched to UTF8 successfully, though.
    up
    -2
    vrbcik
    18 years ago
    I have had problems with encoding after export of tables (from hosting - via PhpMyAdmin) and import them to other machine (my notebook - via PhpMyAdmin too). In PhpMyAdmin the encoding of all data was shown correctly, not that good with the web pages (data pulled via php).
    The first point is indication, that the data was imported correctly, but php script has got other character set than MySql is sending.

    The script's character set is set in header: <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-2">. MySql setting was latin1.

    Then following code helped me:

    <?php
    mysql_query    ("SET CHARACTER SET 'latin2'", $conn);
    ?>
    up
    -3
    devos at montp dot inserm dot fr
    17 years ago
    I use mysql 3.23 and none of the above worked for me. Looking at http://dev.mysql.com/tech-resources/articles/4.1/unicode.html as advised by romain at dardour dot com, I tried to include the following header in my php scripts, and all the funy characters disapeared. Hope it will help.

    <?php header("Content-type: text/html; charset=latin1");?>

    (my mysql character was latin1)
    up
    -4
    Anonymous
    18 years ago
    A very easy way to always get results in UTF-8 is to make a common function to connect to DB and in that function set character set to utf-8.

    function OpenConn() {
      global $link;
      $link = mysql_connect ("localhost", "username", "password")
          or die(sendError('Could not connect to DB'));
      mysql_select_db ("dbName");
      //
      // Set character set to UTF-8
      //
      mysql_query("SET CHARACTER SET 'utf8'", $link);
    }
    up
    -6
    black at scene-si dot org
    20 years ago
    the above (as it seems to be vaguely indicated in the mysql manual) works only with mysql 4.1+
    up
    -7
    stian at grytoyr dot net
    20 years ago
    If you experience weird problems, like some UTF-8 characters (the Unicode character &#x010D and a few others in my case) seemingly being changed to garbage by mysql_query, you may need to do something like this before your actual query:

    <?php
    mysql_query    ("SET NAMES 'utf8'", $conn);
    ?>

    Took me days to figure that one out...
    add a note add a note
    To Top