Loading Unicode Characters with Oracle SQL Loader (sqlldr) results in question marks - oracle

Question

I'm trying to load localized strings from a unicode (UTF8-encoded) csv using SQL Loader into an oracle database. I've tried all sort of combinations but nothing seems to give me the result I'm looking for which is to have special greek characters like (Δ) not get converted to Δ or ¿.
My table definition looks like this:
CREATE TABLE "GLOBALIZATIONRESOURCE"
(
"RESOURCETYPE" VARCHAR2(255 CHAR) NOT NULL ENABLE,
"CULTURE" VARCHAR2(20 CHAR) NOT NULL ENABLE,
"KEY" VARCHAR2(128 CHAR) NOT NULL ENABLE,
"VALUE" VARCHAR2(2048 CHAR),
"DESCRIPTION" VARCHAR2(512 CHAR),
CONSTRAINT "PK_GLOBALIZATIONRESOURCE" PRIMARY KEY ("RESOURCETYPE","CULTURE","KEY") USING INDEX TABLESPACE REPSPACE_IX ENABLE
)
TABLESPACE REPSPACE;
I have tried the following configurations in my control file (and actually every permutation I could think of)
load data
TRUNCATE
INTO TABLE "GLOBALIZATIONRESOURCE"
FIELDS TERMINATED BY "," OPTIONALLY ENCLOSED BY '"'
TRAILING NULLCOLS
(
"RESOURCETYPE" CHAR(255),
"CULTURE" CHAR(20),
"KEY" CHAR(128),
"VALUE" CHAR(2048),
"DESCRIPTION" CHAR(512)
)
load data
CHARACTERSET UTF8
TRUNCATE
INTO TABLE "GLOBALIZATIONRESOURCE"
FIELDS TERMINATED BY "," OPTIONALLY ENCLOSED BY '"'
TRAILING NULLCOLS
(
"RESOURCETYPE" CHAR(255),
"CULTURE" CHAR(20),
"KEY" CHAR(128),
"VALUE" CHAR(2048),
"DESCRIPTION" CHAR(512)
)
load data
CHARACTERSET UTF16
TRUNCATE
INTO TABLE "GLOBALIZATIONRESOURCE"
FIELDS TERMINATED BY X'002c' OPTIONALLY ENCLOSED BY X'0022'
TRAILING NULLCOLS
(
"RESOURCETYPE" CHAR(255),
"CULTURE" CHAR(20),
"KEY" CHAR(128),
"VALUE" CHAR(2048),
"DESCRIPTION" CHAR(512)
)
With the first two options, the unicode characters don't get encoded and just show up as upside down question marks.
If I choose last option, UTF16, then I get the following error even though all my data in my fields are much shorter than the length specified.
Field in data file exceeds maximum length
It seems as though every possible combination of ctl file configurations (even setting the byte order to little and big) doesn't work correctly. Can someone please give an example of a configuration (table structure and CTL file) that correctly loads unicode data from a csv? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Note: I've already been to http://docs.oracle.com/cd/B19306_01/server.102/b14215/ldr_concepts.htm, http://docs.oracle.com/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96652/ch10.htm and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96652/ch10.htm.

Answer 1

I had same issue and resolved by below steps -
Open data file into Notepad++ , Go to "Encoding" dropdown and select UTF8 encoding and save file.
use CHARACTERSET UTF8 into CTL file and then upload data.

Answer 2

You have two problem;
Character set.
Answer: You can solve this problem by finding your text character set (most of time notepad++ can do this.). After finding character set, you have to find sqlldr correspond of character set name. So, you can find this info from link https://docs.oracle.com/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96529/appa.htm#975313
After all of these, you should solve character set problem.
In contrast to your actual data length, sqlldr says that, Field in data file exceeds maximum length.
Answer: You can solve this problem by adding CHAR(4000) (or what the actual length is) to problematic column. In my case, the problematic column is "E" column. Example is below. In my case I solved my problem in this way, hope helps.
LOAD DATA
CHARACTERSET UTF8
-- This line is comment
-- Turkish charset (for ÜĞİŞ etc.)
-- CHARACTERSET WE8ISO8859P9
-- Character list is here.
-- https://docs.oracle.com/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96529/appa.htm#975313
INFILE 'data.txt' "STR '~|~\n'"
TRUNCATE
INTO TABLE SILTAB
FIELDS TERMINATED BY '#'
TRAILING NULLCOLS
(
a,
b,
c,
d,
e CHAR(4000)
)

Answer 3

You must ensure that the following charactersets are the same:
db characterset
dump file characterset
the client from which you are doing the import (NLS_LANG)
If the client-side characterset is different, oracle will attempt to perform character conversions to the native db characterset and this might not always provide the desired result.

Answer 4

Don't use MS Office to save the spreadsheet into unicode .csv.
Instead, use OpenOffice to save into unicode-UTF8 .csv file.
Then in the loader control file, add "CHARACTERSET UTF8"
run Oracle SQL*Loader, this gives me correct results

Answer 5

There is a range of character set encoding that you can use in control file while loading data from sql loader.
For greek characters I believe Western European char set should do the trick.
LOAD DATA
CHARACTERSET WE8ISO8859P1
or in case of MS word input files with smart characters try in control file
LOAD DATA
CHARACTERSET WE8MSWIN1252