Search code examples
mysqlmariadbcollationinformation-schemautf8mb4

Why are information_schema and performance_schema not utf8mb4 (and should I care)?


I have been going through my MariaDB installation with a fine-toothed comb trying to update everything from utf8 (3-byte flavor) to utf8mb4. It's correct in my.cnf, all my databases, and all applicable tables and columns thereof. And when I create new databases with no options, it does create them with the correct collation. But see this screenshot of Adminer - two of the three infrastructure databases are still utf8. Is this okay? If not, how should I change them? This server isn't live yet, but it's very close to ready, so I'd rather not do something stupid and break the DB engine.

enter image description here


Solution

  • Do not change anything in mysql, performance_schema, or information_schema.

    Beware of any indexed VARCHAR(255) CHARACTER SET utf8 -- they will have trouble with a limit of 767 bytes on the index.