> I would like to import data from a utf8-coded comma seperated file. I
> created my database with "DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE
> utf8_general_ci" and I started my mysql-client with the
> --default-character-set=utf8 option. Nevertheless, when I input primary
> key fields, which differ only in one umlaut character (e.g. "achten" and
> "ächten") I get the following error message:
>
> ERROR 1062 (23000): Duplicate entry 'ächten' for key 1
>
> (Same thing happens when I try to manually INSERT the row.)
>
> When I display my variable settings with "SHOW variables LIKE
> 'c%';" I receive the following result:
>
>
> +--------------------------+----------------------------+
> | Variable_name | Value |
> +--------------------------+----------------------------+
> | character_set_client | utf8 |
> | character_set_connection | utf8 |
> | character_set_database | utf8 |
> | character_set_filesystem | binary |
> | character_set_results | utf8 |
> | character_set_server | latin1 |
> | character_set_system | utf8 |
> | character_sets_dir | /usr/share/mysql/charsets/ |
> | collation_connection | utf8_general_ci |
> | collation_database | utf8_general_ci |
> | collation_server | latin1_swedish_ci |
> | completion_type | 0 |
> | concurrent_insert | 1 |
> | connect_timeout | 5 |
> +--------------------------+----------------------------+
> 14 rows in set (0.02 sec)
>
> From this I conclude it is the server setting, which causes the trouble
> here. When I manipulate the settings manually from the client (with "SET
> character_set_server=utf8; SET collation_server=utf8_general_ci;") the
> values do change, but not the behaviour. But this can be expected, since
> the server is already up and running with the wrong settings.
>
> Does anybody know how I restart my mysql-server with the correct
> character and collation settings, if this is the cause for my problem,
> or if there might be any other reason for it. My mysql version is
> 5.0.26-12, running on a Suse Linux 10.2.
>
> Best regards,
> H.

Try using the SET NAMES 'utf8' statement [1] to tell MySQL that your client
is sending data in UTF-8. I believe that as your server is latin1, it will
assume this is the character set used by the command line client.

[1] http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/...onnection.html

Edward