How to change the default character set of MySQL to utf8 on MAC

1. Check the character set of the default installed MySQL

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/local/mysql-5.5.23-osx10.6-x86_64/share/charsets/ |
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+
8 rows in set (0.00 sec)

character_set_database and character_set_server are still latin1 character sets, which means that the tables created by MySQL later are all in latin1 character sets, not utf8, which will cause some trouble. Therefore, it is necessary to modify my.cnf. Be sure to close the MySQL process before modifying my.cnf, otherwise you will encounter the problem that MySQL's sock cannot connect.

2. Close the mysqld background process

Control mysqld in the system preferences, avoiding the trouble of finding the installation location of mysqld.

Click Stop MySQL Server

3. Modify the mysql configuration file /etc/my.cnf

sudo cp /usr/local/mysql/support-files/my-medium.cnf /etc/my.cnf

sudo vi /etc/my.cnf

[client] section added:

default-character-set=utf8

[mysqld] section added:

character-set-server=utf8

After the modification is completed, start mysql

4. Check the results:

mysql> show variables like '%char%';
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+
| Variable_name | Value |
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+
| character_set_client | utf8 |
| character_set_connection | utf8 |
| character_set_database | utf8 |
| character_set_filesystem | binary |
| character_set_results | utf8 |
| character_set_server | utf8 |
| character_set_system | utf8 |
| character_sets_dir | /usr/local/mysql-5.5.23-osx10.6-x86_64/share/charsets/ |
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------+
8 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Modification completed#