Mysql 5.5 how to set up everything to utf8? - mysql

Question

I just want everything default to utf8. I've checked this question but nothing help.
Currently, My /etc/my.cnf is
[mysqld]
collation-server = utf8_unicode_ci
init-connect='SET NAMES utf8'
character-set-server = utf8
But when I restart the server, create a new database, it is still latin1(character_set_database and character_set_server):
mysql> show variables like 'char%';
+--------------------------+----------------------------+
| Variable_name | Value |
+--------------------------+----------------------------+
| character_set_client | utf8 |
| character_set_connection | utf8 |
| character_set_database | latin1 |
| character_set_filesystem | binary |
| character_set_results | utf8 |
| character_set_server | latin1 |
| character_set_system | utf8 |
| character_sets_dir | /usr/share/mysql/charsets/ |
+--------------------------+----------------------------+
8 rows in set (0.00 sec)
mysql> show variables like 'collation%';
+----------------------+-------------------+
| Variable_name | Value |
+----------------------+-------------------+
| collation_connection | utf8_general_ci |
| collation_database | latin1_swedish_ci |
| collation_server | latin1_swedish_ci |
+----------------------+-------------------+
3 rows in set (0.00 sec)
When I create a database, It is latin1:
mysql> create database d1;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)
mysql> use d1;
Database changed
mysql> show variables like "character_set_database";
+------------------------+--------+
| Variable_name | Value |
+------------------------+--------+
| character_set_database | latin1 |
+------------------------+--------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)
When I create a table in this database, it can't recognize valid utf8 啊：
mysql> create table t1(name varchar(1) default '啊');
ERROR 1067 (42000): Invalid default value for 'name'
I know alter database d1 character set utf8; will fix this. But I just want everything default to utf8, is it possible?

Answer 1

This is tricky.
The character set and collation for the default database can be
determined from the values of the character_set_database and
collation_database system variables. The server sets these variables
whenever the default database changes. If there is no default
database, the variables have the same value as the corresponding
server-level system variables, character_set_server and
collation_server.
So one would assume the default for the collation-database is the same as the default for the collation-server variable.
Please check the following:
Is there any other config that would override your my.cnf, like /etc/mysql/mysql.cnf or ~/.my.cnf ?
The client (not server!) is setting its own collation upon startup, so you could set a client collation/encoding through [mysql] (not mysqld) or look if this is already set somewhere.
You do SHOW VARIABLES ... - this is querying SESSION based variables, try to query explicitly global settings through SHOW GLOBAL VARIABLES ...