--- In firebird-support@yahoogroups.com, "Martijn Tonies" <m.tonies@...> wrote:

>
> Hi,
>

Hi Martijn,
thanks for your reply.

> > 3.3 Doing everything manually
> > Means probably the most work, but appears to be the safest way at the
> > moment.
> > 3.3.1 I could start with the final UTF8 database, i.e. with all the
> > structure changes etc. included
> > 3.3.2 The source database would be accessed by a connection with ISO8859_1
> > as character set, the UTF8 one by a connection with UTF8 as character set
>
> This would work if the application is able to read ISO8859_1 and write UTF8,

What do you mean by this? My new application is written in Delphi XE, which supports unicode. Wouldn't reading work with an connection, which has ISO8859_1 as character set? Maybe I could even access the fields as AnsiString if needed. The writing would happen over the UTF8 connection.

> I think the DataPump
> in Database Workbench should be able to do that for you.
>

I need to do the upgrade at customers machnies, so I fear Database Workbench can't help me here.

> Use USO8859_1, no Unicode client, for the source, and UTF8, Unicode client
> for the destination.

Hm, same as above... I hoped to do it with one client (if it shall be the point "3.3 Doing everything manually" from my first post).. How else can I get the data from the ISO8859_1 client to the UTF8 one?

> > Regarding 3.1.4 and 3.2.4: I've found this example on how to change the
> > blob type:
> > UPDATE RDB$FIELDS SET RDB$FIELD_SUB_TYPE = 0
> > WHERE RDB$FIELD_NAME=(SELECT RDB$FIELD_SOURCE FROM RDB$RELATION_FIELDS
> > WHERE RDB$FIELD_NAME='SOME_TEXT_BLOB_FIELD' AND
> > RDB$RELATION_NAME='SOME_TABLE');
> > Seems to work without the content getting lost. Sure, it's in the wrong
> > format that way, but it seems to be possible to obtaint the content and
> > then to save it in the new format. But depending on the choice of the way
> > to go, this could be irrelevant.
>
> You are modifying the blob to BINARY, that doesn't sound right.
>

Yes, didn't look that "healthy" to me too, but has worked and that's what IBExpert (I believe) has made of my attempt to change the sub type manually.