### Problem in retrieving special characters with Oracle 9i JDBC drivers

Question

hi,
We are having some problem with retrieving special characters like '�' from the database.
Our application is using JDK1.3.1 with Oracle 9i at the back end(Version: 9.0.1.0.0). We are using oracle 9i thin drivers (classes12.zip) for database interaction.
To relieve the data from database we are using PreparedStatement in two ways
1. Creating a preparedstatement from connection object without any parameters and then retrieve the
data using it. This gives the results in correct format i.e. special characters like '�'
2. Create the preparedstatement by passing the following parameters.
i) ResultSet.TYPE_SCROLL_INSENSITIVE
ii) ResultSet.CONCUR_READ_ONLY
In this case we are not able to retrieve the special character like '�' correctly. Instead the ResultSet
returns 'h'
I think this is the problem with Oracle drivers. Does anyone have any information about the mentioned problem.
rgds

Answer 1

I don't know exactly (because I am using JDK 1.4 with ojdbc14.jar where these problems seem to be rare...) but you may consider this:
1. Add nls_charset12.zip to your classpath to ensure that the encoders are present (may or may not help)
2. Swith to JDK 1.4, and do this:
Instead of String s = getString(column)
use
byte[] bytes = getBytes(column);
ByteBuffer bb = ByteBuffer.wrap(bytes); // in package java.nio
CharBuffer cb = Charset.forname("ISO-8859-x").decode(bb);
String s = cb.toString();
The latter method allows you to perform the encoding/decoding manually.
3. Change the character encoding in the database to unicode upon database setup.
4. Try playing with NLS parameters (alter session ...)