Traditional Chinese Chacterstic shows question mark in SQL Input Preview

[Alex_yang]

Hi Alteryx Expert,

I have one strange issue for input data from SQL

I have one SQL database which is 2008 and it stored data for traditional Chinese characteristic

I need to export some table result from this Chinese SQL to another via Alteryx

What I notice is when I create input data for that Chinese SQL and preview data, all traditional Chinese showing question mark

Even I tried codepage conversation function but result is still in question mark

What I have done so far is

1. install traditional Chinese language pack in my laptop and result is still wrong

2. upload CSV file with result manually export from the SQL and it looks fine in Alteryx

3. run the in-DB function but result is still same

Please let me know how to resolve this

[Yzy · Accepted solution]

Hi All,

May I know your comment?

One thing i notice is that if we run the SQL code in SSMS, it shows correct Chinese characteristic

Best regards

Alex yang 

[SeanAdams · Accepted solution]

Hey @Alex_yang and @Yzy

Are you bringing these into a string field as v_string?  This may be the problem, since you need to use V_WString to support the extended character set.

Alternatively, if you're still stuck, then are you able to post a few things to help debug this quickly:

- A simple table create script of 1 or 2 columsn in SQL

- an insert statement to insert a row into this table with the requried characters

- and then just confirmation of the outcome you are looking for (I think you're just looking to copy the data from one table to another?)

thank you

Sean

[Yzy]

Hi Sean,

Thanks for your reply

The issue is when we preview the data in Alteryx, it already showing question mark before we sending any data out

Alteryx PreviewSQL Original

[Yzy]

Hi Sean,

I know the reason now

This is due to the database is using VARCHAR to store the traditional Chinese code and I put cast to NVARCHAR and preview again

Result is fine in Alteryx now

Thanks for your help on this

Best regrds

Alex yang

[SeanAdams]

Very very glad that you found it - I have struggled with international characters quite a bit in the past so very glad that you got to the bottom of it.

Have a good weekend
Sean