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2

How can i change database encoding for a PostgreSQL database using sql or phpPgAdmin?

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3 Answers 3

up vote 36 down vote accepted

You have to perform:

  1. database dump,
  2. delete database,
  3. create database with new encoding,
  4. import data from dump created in point 1.

Changing it on-the-fly isn't possible as it would require rewriting most of internal database data which is almost equal to recreating db way I described.

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1  
+1 I came here to say this. – Paul Tomblin Dec 19 '08 at 13:24
    
i have a cpanel account and if i backup the database i will be able to restore only the content and not to recreate database with new encoding – daniels Dec 19 '08 at 13:24
    
drop = delete, here's link to cpanel docs: cpanel.net/support/docs/11/cpanel/databases_delete_post.html – romke Dec 19 '08 at 13:35
1  
PostgreSQL newbie here... How can you do this using SQL and/or the psql command-line tool? For example if the database and server is currently set to SQL_ASCII, but I want it to be UTF-8? – Svish Feb 15 '11 at 12:24
3  
newbie or not, you must know your tools, use pg_dump for database dumping, psql -f for importing previously dumped data. delete/create database you can use many different tools, sql (DROP DATABASE/CREATE DATABASE [postgresql.org/docs/9.0/static/sql-createdatabase.html]), phpPgAdmin, pgAdmin (visual tools). READ tool documentation before performing any action. – romke Feb 17 '11 at 20:42
up vote 3 down vote

You can change encoding on the fly without dump/restore:

update pg_database set encoding = pg_char_to_encoding('UTF8') where datname = 'database_name'
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Now this is a useful answer. "Create database with new encoding" is an incredibly unhelpful instruction when the very question is "How do I change the encoding on a database?" – Bobort Aug 20 at 18:14
up vote 1 down vote

To expand on the answers given, you can use these commands to accomplish your task.

// Backup the database to outfile
pg_dump dbname > outfile

// Terminate all connections to the database
psql -c "SELECT pg_terminate_backend(pid) FROM pg_stat_activity WHERE datname='dbname';"

// Delete the database
psql -c "DROP DATABASE dbname;"

//Re-create the database using the encoding keyword
psql -c "CREATE DATABASE dbname ENCODING='UTF8';"

//Import the saved data
psql -f outfile

Dumping database: http://www.postgresql.org/docs/9.4/static/backup-dump.html

Creating database: http://www.postgresql.org/docs/9.4/static/sql-createdatabase.html

This is a list of all encodings available for version 9.4: http://www.postgresql.org/docs/9.4/static/multibyte.html#MULTIBYTE-CHARSET-SUPPORTED

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