Storing foreign characters

[johnrb87]

Hi all

 

I have a database table with a whole load of foreign words in it, they are basically company names and location names, but they are stored in different languages such as Indian, French, Arabic, Chinese and so on.

 

So for example, I have data such as

 

الفجيرة
Ra's al Khaymah

 

But in the database this data is stored as

 

"VARCHAR" with "utf8_bin"

 

and the data is stored like

 

الÙجيرة

 

 

This is fine, because it correctly decodes on the front end and the correct symbols etc.

 

My problem is that I want to have another column in the same database which shows the correct converted value, so in the database, it would look something like

 

الÙجيرة        الفجيرة

 

 

so on the left side, it would show the encoded value, and on the right side, it would have the true value.

 

I tried writing a script to grab the value from the table and then insert it into the same row, but whenever I try and pass

 

الفجيرة

 

though an "UPDATE" script, it keeps converting that value to

 

الÙجيرة

 

So my question is, is there anyway to tell PHP to insert

 

الفجيرة

 

into the database, rather than it inserting

 

الÙجيرة

 

instead???

 

Any help would be great.

 

Thanks

 

JohN

[premiso]

What is the column type of the other column is it just utf8 or utf8_bin?

[johnrb87]

I've tried multiple types for the other column, but nothing seemed to work.

 

Do you have any suggestions on what might be the best column type to try for multiple languages?

[johnrb87]

I've tried most of them, but no luck with any I try.

 

Any ideas? Or is this just not possible

[johnrb87]

Seems like

 

linestring

 

works, is there any known issues with using linestring?