Question

I have a java program that I made that will create a 5 digit string and add it to a mysql database. The strings that are generated will be every combination of the numbers 1-9 the letters a-z and A-Z like

00000
…
00009
0000a
…
0000z
0000A
…
0000Z
00010
…
00019

and so on

My problem is when adding these values to the database it will not add 0000A because 0000a is already in there

for example if I

INSERT INTO `mytable`(`mycolumn`) VALUES ("00000");

INSERT INTO `mytable`(`mycolumn`) VALUES ("0000a");

INSERT INTO `mytable`(`mycolumn`) VALUES ("0000A");

the only values that appear in my database are 00000 and 0000a

Is there anyway to have mysql make this distinction between the two so I can have strings that appear unique

Answer 1

MySql strings are case sensitive by default.

You could use a case sensitive collation like utf8_bin in the MYCOLUMN field:

CREATE TABLE MYTABLE (
    ID BIGINT AUTO_INCREMENT, 
    // other fields...

    MYCOLUMN VARCHAR(128) CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE utf8_bin NOT NULL UNIQUE, 
    PRIMARY KEY(ID)
);