Re: Questions about encoding between two databases

On Thursday 20 August 2009 11:45:30 pm Archibald Zimonyi wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I am sitting on version 7.4.x and am going to upgrade to version 8.3.x.
> From all I can read I should have no problem with actual format of the
> pgdump file (for actual dumping and restoring purposes) but I am
> having problems with encoding (which I was fairly sure I would). I have
> searched the web for solutions and one solution given (in one thread where
> Tom Lane answered) was to set the correct encoding in the version 8.3.x
> database.
>
> However, the default encoding in the version 8.3.x instance is
> currently UTF8 and I am happy with that. The encoding for most of the
> databases in the version 7.4.x was LATIN1. Is there any way I can ignore
> the LATIN1 encoding and force the database to accept the UTF8 encoding of
> the new version 8.3.x instance?
>
> I get the below message when I try the psql -f <file> <database> command.
>
> psql:aranzo20090812:30: ERROR: encoding LATIN1 does not match server's
> locale en_US.UTF-8
> DETAIL: The server's LC_CTYPE setting requires encoding UTF8.
>
> Any help would be appreciated.
>
> Archie

To get the question out of the way, is there a reason you are not upgrading to
latest version, 8.4?

Suggestion below is untested:
Use pg_dump from 8.3.x to dump from 7.4 database.

From here:
http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.3/interactive/app-pgdump.html

"
-E encoding
--encoding=encoding

Create the dump in the specified character set encoding. By default, the
dump is created in the database encoding. (Another way to get the same result
is to set the PGCLIENTENCODING environment variable to the desired dump
encoding.) "

Use the encoding switch to create the dump in UTF8.

--
Adrian Klaver
aklaver(at)comcast(dot)net