Chinese and Japanese characters not working with mysql - mysql

Question

I have a table named CHINESE which has only one column NAME.
The output of SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'char%' is:
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+
| 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/local/mysql-5.1.73-osx10.6-x86_64/share/charsets/ |
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+
When I run this query: INSERT INTO CHINESE VALUES ('你好'), the values get inserted.
But, when I try to execute this query: SELECT * FROM CHINESE, the result is:
+------+
| NAME |
+------+
| ?? |
+------+
The result of SELECT HEX(NAME) FROM CHINESE is:
+-----------+
| HEX(NAME) |
+-----------+
| 3F3F |
+-----------+
Where am I making mistake?

Answer 1

If mysql>=5.5.3, use utf8mb4 .
Alter origin table
ALTER TABLE $tablename
CONVERT TO CHARACTER SET utf8mb4
COLLATE utf8mb4_general_ci
Create new table
CREATE TABLE $tablename (
`id` int(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
PRIMARY KEY (`id`)
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8mb4;
Modify Column
ALTER TABLE $tablename
MODIFY $col1
VARCHAR(191)
CHARACTER SET utf8mb4;
refer: Mysql DOC: Column Character Set Conversion

Answer 2

Try the following to change the character set: SET NAMES 'big5';