How to find Non-Unicode Character in R77.30 MDS

[Rajput_Arvind]

Hi,

We received below when we run Pre_Upgrade_Verifier on R77.30 MDS. It suggests to run  Check_Point_R80_Encoding_Detection_sk109795  to identify the non-Unicode encoding, but this is exe file which runs on Windows machine. So just wanted to know how I can find non-Unicode encoding by running this utility.

When I run Encoding_Detection.exe, it doesn't ask for Domain management credentials. so not sure if this utility will help. Please suggest.

Objects with non-Unicode characters
Description: The database contains objects with non-Unicode characters. Remove the non-Unicode characters or follow the instructions in sk114739 before running the upgrade process.

These tables contain objects with non-Unicode characters:
fw_policies
network_objects
services

Thanks,

Arvind

[Dima_M]

Hello Rajit,

The utility you mentioned intended to detect and display the encoding on client you running SmartConsole on.  

Once you got it, use the detected value to set the CHECKPOINT_DB_ENCODING environment variable accordingly on MDS itself.

[Rajput_Arvind]

If I understood it correctly then we only need to run the utility on a machine where Smart Console is installed.

I have run this utility on that machine and got "WINDOWS-1252" as a result. Is this sufficient to add this value in CHECKPOINT_DB_ENCODING?

We won't get Non-Unicode again after adding this value?

[PhoneBoy · Accepted solution]

This environment variable is used by the migration tools to convert from the specified encoding (WINDOWS-1252, in your case) to Unicode.
It will leave the existing MDS alone, i.e. won't convert it to Unicode.

[Rajput_Arvind]

I followed sk114739 and now Non-Unicode character issue is resolved.

[Black_Cyborg · Accepted solution]

You can verify policy and objects files (objects.C, objects_5_0.C, rules.C) located in the MDS directory using the following command:

grep --color='auto' -P -n "[\x80-\xFF]" filename

This command will return all lines where non ASCII chars exists. Usually, the most ocurrences are at objects name or description. You can either manually edit the file or modify the object through SmartDashboard by doing a manual search.