GB Pound sterling symbol £ importing from script

Question

Apex v3.1.2.00.02
I am migrating a large application to a new network.
I exported the original app from the old network as Unicode UTF-8 character set. I have since completed a lot of development work on the app on the new network for hardening purposes.
My problem comes now when I try to export the app from the new network (for transport to test and live environments). The app has a large number of "£" (GB pound sterling) signs hard coded into column headers and text.
When I export the application, all the £ signs change to £
I'm thinking this is a character set issue, but I don't get an option to change the character set on export... it is set to Unicode UTF-8.
I tried a find and replace in the exported source code (which I know is unsupported), but that ended up producing another funny character (a diamond with a ? in the middle of it) instead of the £ symbol.
Does anyone know how to fix this?
Thanks in advance,
Gus..

Answer 1

Hi Joel...
You are right, it isn't fixed...
in our new system, we have in our F:\oracle\product\10gAS\10g_MT\Apache\modplsql\conf\marvel.conf file... (xxx's are blanked out data)
<Location /xxxx>
    Order deny,allow
    PlsqlDocumentPath docs
    AllowOverride None
    PlsqlDocumentProcedure wwv_flow_file_mgr.process_download
    PlsqlDatabaseConnectString APEX_xxxxxxxx
    PlsqlNLSLanguage AMERICAN_AMERICA.AL32UTF8
    PlsqlAuthenticationMode Basic
    SetHandler pls_handler
    PlsqlDocumentTablename wwv_flow_file_objects$
    PlsqlDatabaseUsername APEX_PUBLIC_USER
    PlsqlDefaultPage apex
    PlsqlDatabasePassword xxxxxxxxxx
    Allow from all
</Location>From my tests, if I export from the Apex application Import/Export button, (exporting as DOS) I get the funny character in the export file.
If I import that application back in using the Apex application Import/Export button, I have no problem, the characters are interpreted correctly.
If I import the application using our automated migration script (below), the characters are NOT interpreted correctly, we get £ instead of £shown in the Apex development environment and on the running application.
migration .bat file runningsqlplus / as sysdba @"SQL Scripts\110_CREATE_APEX_COMPONENTS" !WSPwd!110_CREATE_APEX_COMPONENTS.sql is....WHENEVER sqlerror EXIT
SET serveroutput ON
SET define '^'
SET sqlprefix OFF
SET VERIFY OFF
SPOOL Logs\LOG_CREATE_APEX_COMPONENTS.log
ALTER SESSION SET CURRENT_SCHEMA=FLOWS_030100;
begin
    wwv_flow_api.set_security_group_id(p_security_group_id=>xxxx);
end;
prompt  Creating workspace ATSYS...
begin
wwv_flow_fnd_user_api.create_company (
  p_id                      => xx...,
  p_provisioning_company_id => xxxx,
  p_short_name              => 'ATxxx',
  p_first_schema_provisioned=> 'ATxxx',
  p_company_schemas         => 'ATxxx',
  p_expire_fnd_user_accounts=> '',
  p_account_lifetime_days=> '',
  p_fnd_user_max_login_failures=> '');
end;
prompt  Creating Groups...
prompt  Creating Users...
begin
wwv_flow_fnd_user_api.create_fnd_user (
  p_user_id      => 'xxxx',
  p_user_name    => 'ATxxx_ADMIN',
  p_first_name   => '',
  p_last_name    => '',
  p_description  => '',
  p_email_address=> 'admin@xxxxxx',
  p_web_password => '^1',
  p_web_password_format => 'CLEAR_TEXT',
  p_group_ids    => '',
  p_developer_privs=> 'ADMIN:CREATE:DATA_LOADER:EDIT:HELP:MONITOR:SQL',
  p_default_schema=> 'ATxxx',
  p_account_locked=> 'Y',
  p_account_expiry=> to_date('200806130000','YYYYMMDDHH24MI'),
  p_failed_access_attempts=> 4,
  p_change_password_on_first_use=> 'N',
  p_first_password_use_occurred=> 'Y',
  p_allow_access_to_schemas => '');
end;
@"Code\APEX Exports\ATxxx Application"
COMMIT;
SET VERIFY ON
SPOOL OFF
EXITwhere 'ATxxx Application.sql' is the exported application using the Apex application Import/Export button.
It does look like this issue...
Re: Apex export error on 'special' characters (ie. ë and ©)
but in a windows environment...
Is there something I need to add to my script to make it work like stefan did?
Thanks,
Gus..