MySQL Bugs: #116476: Changing Characterset from Latin1 to utf8mb4 across DBs and Tables.

Bug #116476	Changing Characterset from Latin1 to utf8mb4 across DBs and Tables.
Submitted:	25 Oct 2024 4:50	Modified:	25 Oct 2024 11:29
Reporter:	Kishan Kumar	Email Updates:
Status:	Not a Bug	Impact on me:	None
Category:	MySQL Server: Charsets	Severity:	S3 (Non-critical)
Version:	8.0.28	OS:	Any
Assigned to:		CPU Architecture:	Any
Tags:	character encoding, mysql collation issue

Description:
Hi Team,

We are in a situation where one of our newly launched Database cluster is running with default character set of Latin1 . This was due to an issue in our launch script which kind of ignored the database parameter group values while launching the cluster. 

Subsequently, the parameter group was overridden and released, ensuring that any new databases would use the correct charset (utf8mb4). However, the databases created during the initial launch continue to use latin1. 

Currently we saw an issue where an ALTER query was applied on a table created during initial cluster launch,without specifying the charset or collation at the column level.
As a result, the columns inherited the table or database-level charset and collation, which were set to latin1 during the initial cluster launch.

This caused data incompatibility issues because the expected charset across the cluster was utf8mb4.

We want some guidance from the Mysql team on changing these inital table , database collation from latin1 to utf8mb4 without affecting the data in these database. Any new DB or table created are following the correct characterset, but we want to make all the Dbs to be in same characterset.

Any scripts , tools which we can use to accomplish this would be of great help.

How to repeat:
NA

Suggested fix:
NA

Hi Mr. Kumar,

Thank you for your bug report.

However, what you describe is expected behaviour and not a bug.

That is exactly the kind of problem that occurs in the server when making mistakes like this one.

But, this is a site for reporting a bug with a fully repeatable test case.

What you report is not a bug, but a request for support or guidance.

This is not a forum for support.

If you wish, we can send you links for both free and paid support, so that you can get guidance that you need.

Not a bug.

HI Team,

Can you please provide the links.

Hi Mr. Kumar,

This is a link for the free support:

https://forums.mysql.com/

and this is a link for the paid support:

https://www.mysql.com/support/