While upgrading my 3.4.x site, I noticed my other forums are on UTF8. Doing some research it seems UTF8MB4 is required for Emoji's. I didn't knew that while back. 

How can I convert my IPS 4.7.6 site DB which is using UTF8 to UTF8MB4? I tried to search in market place and nothing comes up under IPS Community Extras. 

Thanks.

ACP > Support, under database there should be an option to convert to UTF8mb4 

This seems odd:

 

 

Does this means only few tables where converted in past? I see mix and match - especially more on custom application tables but i do see few IPS Core tables on utf8 as well.

 

 

 

The database checker checks only tables in the applications schema.json files. Any extra tables not in there are skipped. And all the utf8_unicode_ci tables in your screenshots are old/unused tables the upgrade process failed to drop. Or probably tables from old modifications that weren't removed properly (like the ipb_jlogica_XXX tables).

 

The 2 tables marked in your second screenshot by that red rectangle are 3.x tables that are not present in 4.x, you can safely delete them.

Edited January 15, 20232 yr by teraßyte

Do you already have it set as using mb4 in your conf_global.php file? If so, thats likely why you are not seeing the option to convert to mb4

On 1/16/2023 at 6:33 AM, Marc Stridgen said:

Do you already have it set as using mb4 in your conf_global.php file? If so, thats likely why you are not seeing the option to convert to mb4

Sorry, I don't have that set in conf_global.php. Interesting updating is when I updated another forum from 3.4.x to latest version, i see different behavior. 

The one in problem seems to be regularly updated. 

On 1/15/2023 at 5:36 PM, teraßyte said:

And all the utf8_unicode_ci tables in your screenshots are old/unused tables the upgrade process failed to drop. Or probably tables from old modifications that weren't removed properly (like the ipb_jlogica_XXX tables).

Is their anyway for me to figure out which tables are not used, so i can drop them permanently?

Thank you both.

4 hours ago, AlexJ said:

Sorry, I don't have that set in conf_global.php.

This is the issue. Click to convert it again. When it gets to the end, it gives you a line you have to add to your conf_global file

13 hours ago, AlexJ said:

Is their anyway for me to figure out which tables are not used, so i can drop them permanently?

Thank you both.

The only way would be to compare the list of tables to a fresh install and account for the additional tables added by installed modifications. That's how I usually do it, especially after a legacy upgrade.