NLS_LANG Parameters

NLS_LANG Parameters

Oracle8i Personal Edition for Windows 98 provides NLS that enables users to interact with a database in their own language, as defined by the NLS_LANG parameter. When you install Oracle8i Personal Edition for Windows 98, the NLS_ LANG parameter is registered by the Net8 Client installation script.

The default value of the NLS_LANG parameter at installation is either that of the existing NLS_LANG parameter of the currently selected Oracle home, or of the default language of the operating system. The default language and NLS_LANG value mappings are listed under "Commonly Used Values for NLS_LANG" on page C-3.

The NLS_LANG parameter is stored in the registry under the HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ORACLE\HOMEID\NLS_LANG subkey, where ID is the unique number identifying the Oracle home.

See Also: Appendix C of Oracle8i Personal Edition Administrator’s Guide for Windows 98 for more information on the subkey locations for multiple Oracle homes

The NLS_LANG parameter uses the following format:

NLS_LANG = LANGUAGE_TERRITORY.CHARACTER_SET where:

CHARACTER_SET Controls the character set used for displaying messages.

See Also: Oracle8i National Language Support Guide for information on the NLS_LANG parameter and NLS initialization parameters

C-2 Oracle8i Personal Edition Installation Guide for Windows 98

Commonly Used Values for NLS_LANG

Commonly Used Values for NLS_LANG

The following table lists commonly used NLS_LANG values for various languages:

National Language Support C-3

Commonly Used Values for NLS_LANG

C-4 Oracle8i Personal Edition Installation Guide for Windows 98

NLS_LANG Settings in MS-DOS Mode and Batch Mode

NLS_LANG Settings in MS-DOS Mode and Batch Mode

When using Oracle utilities such as SQL*Plus, SQL Loader, Import, and Export in MS-DOS mode, the character set field of the NLS_LANG parameter for the session must first be set to the correct value.

This is required because MS-DOS mode uses, with a few exceptions, a different character set (or code-page), for example, OEM code-page, from Windows (ANSI code-page), and the default Oracle home NLS_LANG parameter in the registry is always set to the appropriate Windows code-page. If the NLS_LANG parameter for the MS-DOS mode session is not set appropriately, error messages and data can be corrupted due to incorrect character set conversion.

For Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese, the OEM code-page is identical to the ANSI code-page. In this case, there is no need to set the NLS_LANG in MS-DOS mode.

Similarly, in batch mode, set the correct character set value of the NLS_LANG by inserting a SET NLS_LANG command at the start of the batch procedure, according to the character set of the files to be processed in the procedure.

The following table lists the Oracle character sets that correspond to the OEM primary code-page in MS-DOS mode for each of the supported languages:

National Language Support C-5

NLS_LANG Settings in MS-DOS Mode and Batch Mode

C-6 Oracle8i Personal Edition Installation Guide for Windows 98

D

Getting Started with Your Documentation

This appendix introduces you to the Oracle8i Personal Edition for Windows 98 documentation set. Read this chapter before installing or using Oracle8i Personal Edition.

Specific topics discussed are:

See Also:

Getting Started with Your Documentation D-1