UTF-8 and Japanese collations support for Dedicated SQL pools is now GA!

We are excited to announce that support for UTF-8 and Japanese collations in Azure Synapse Dedicated SQL pools is now generally available!

 

What is UTF-8?

UTF-8 allows storing of multilingual characters in data types CHAR and VARCHAR.  For UTF-16 to store those multilingual characters, the data types NCHAR and NVARCHAR were needed.  This means your schema definition is with only needing to use CHAR and VARCHAR data types, even if you store multilingual characters!

 

Learning more about UTF-8

When your data has a mix of Latin alphabet characters and other multilingual characters, you will save space and improve performance by using UTF-8.  This is because it is able to use less storage space for the Latin alphabet characters.

To learn more about UTF-8 and SQL, check out Introducing UTF-8 support for SQL Server from our SQL Server Team from when UTF-8 support was added for SQL Server.

New Japanese Character Collations

This following list of collations are now supported:

• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_BIN
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_BIN2
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_KS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_KS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_KS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_KS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_KS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AI_KS_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_KS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CI_AS_KS_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_KS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AI_KS_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_WS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_KS
• Japanese_Bushu_Kakusu_140_CS_AS_KS_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_BIN
• Japanese_XJIS_140_BIN2
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_KS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_KS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_KS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_KS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_KS_WS_VSS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_KS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AI_KS_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_KS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CI_AS_KS_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_KS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AI_KS_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_WS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_KS
• Japanese_XJIS_140_CS_AS_KS_WS

 

To learn more about collations in Synapse Dedicated SQL pools, check out Collation support - Azure Synapse Analytics.

 

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