Change Instancedatabase collation

Reference from below links:

http://www.itprotoday.com/microsoft-sql-server/seven-step-process-changing-databases-collation

https://www.mssqltips.com/sqlservertip/3519/changing-sql-server-collation-after-installation/

Before changing a database collation on a production system, you should test the change (including testing the applications that use the database) on a development, test, or quality assurance (QA) system. That way, you can avoid database problems and any surprises in applications' behavior. In addition, you should let the owners or developers of the applications know about the collation change beforehand.

a seven-step process when changing a database collation:

1. Check the database with DBCC CHECKDB WITH DATA_PURITY.
2. Perform a backup with the copy-only option.
3. Change the collation at the database level.
4. Find all the table columns whose collation must be changed and validate the findings with the owners or developers of the applications using the database.
5. Change the collation at the table level.
6. Change the collation of the views.
7. Rebuild the indexes.

Step 1: Check the Database

Although performing a complete integrity check is a good idea, it's not required. In many cases, simply using the DATA_PURITY option can be enough:

DBCC CHECKDB WITH DATA_PURITY

The DATA_PURITY option will check the database for column values that are invalid or out-of-range (i.e., not defined in the code page). For example, it will tell you if value 128 is found, but the current collation doesn't define it.

Step 2: Perform a Backup

The next step is to make a backup of your database. You can perform a copy-only backup so that it won't affect your backup strategy. Here's a sample script you can use to perform the copy-only backup:

BACKUP DATABASE [DBxxx]
  TO DISK = N'B:BackupDBxxx_BeforeCollationChange.bak'
  WITH COPY_ONLY, NOFORMAT, NOINIT,
  NAME = DBxxx_BeforeCollationChange',
  SKIP, NOREWIND, NOUNLOAD, STATS = 10

 

Before you run this script, you need to change each instance of DBxxx to the name of your database.

Step 3: Change the Collation at the Database Level

After you've backed up your database, you can change the database collation. To do so, use the command

ALTER DATABASE [DBxxx] COLLATE New_Collation

where DBxxx is the name of your database and New_Collation is the name of the collation you want to use.

In many cases, this command will run successfully. However, the command might fail and generate error messages concerning functions, primary keys, constraints, or indexes. These objects don't contain primary data, so they can be re-created.

If errors do occur, you need to:

• Drop all functions, primary keys, constraints, and indexes.
• Change the database collation.
• Re-create all the dropped objects. (Don't forget to reassign the rights granted to these objects.)

However, I recommend that you re-create all the dropped objects later in step 7. That way, you might avoid having to redo some work.

If this step goes well, the database properties will show the new collation. Many DBAs will stop here, but as you'll see shortly, this step only changes the default collation for the new objects that will be created in the database. All existing objects still contain data values referring to their origin mapping.

Step 4: Find All the Table Columns Whose Collation Must Be Changed

The collation of all table columns of types char, varchar, text, nchar, nvarchar, and ntext must be changed. To list all the table columns with their current collations, you can run the query:

SELECT t.name, c.name, c.collation_name
FROM sys.columns c INNER JOIN sys.tables t
ON t.object_id = c.object_id
WHERE c.object_id
  IN (SELECT object_id FROM sys.objects WHERE type = 'U')
  AND c.collation_name != 'NULL'
ORDER BY t.name,c.name

In the generated list, you need to look for these three cases:

• Case 1: Columns defined with the old default collation
• Case 2: Columns defined with a collation that differs from the old default collation
• Case 3: Columns defined with a user data type (UDT)

Before making any changes to these columns' collations, you should check with the application owners or developers to see whether the changes will generate bad behaviors in the applications. In addition, if a column falls under case 2, you should ask them why its collation differs from the old default collation. This information will help you determine if the column can be changed to the new default collation.

Step 5: Change the Collation at the Table Level

After the application owners or developers have given you the okay to change the collation of the identified columns, you can make the changes. How you make those changes depends on the three cases identified in step 4.

Case 1. When a column is defined with the old collation, you can change the old collation to the new collation with the command:

ALTER TABLE [] ALTER COLUMN [] <column_type>
  COLLATE <new_collation>

Before you run this command, be sure to replace

, , <column_type>, and <new_collation> with your information.

If the column has constraints or is used by indexes, this command will generate some errors. The referencing constraints and indexes must be dropped, then re-created after the collation is changed.

Case 2. When a column has been defined with a collation that differs from the old default collation, your plan of action depends on what you found out from the application owners or developers. Their explanation will tell you if the column's collation can or can't be changed to the new default collation.

If an application owner or developer doesn't know why a column's collation differs from the old default collation, you shouldn't make any changes if the application wasn't experiencing any bad behaviors or poor performance or if the problems were minimal. If the application was behaving or performing very poorly, you might consider changing the column's collation to the new default one and thoroughly testing the application to see if the situation improves.

Case 3. Administrators sometimes use UDTs, which are based on the system data types (e.g., char, varchar), when several tables must store the same type of data in a column. They must then ensure that these columns have exactly the same data type, length, and nullability. Often, the columns must also have the same format (which is achieved through rules).

For example, suppose that a description column always has a size of 1,000 in the database. To make sure that all the description columns in all the tables have the same size, you can create a UDT named DescriptionString:

CREATE TYPE [dbo].[DescriptionString]
  FROM [varchar](1000) NULL

Then when you're creating the tables, you can use this data type. For example, the following code creates a table named Country whose Description column uses the DescriptionString UDT:

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Country]
(
  [isocode] [char] (2) NOT NULL,
  [fullname] [dbo].[NameString] NULL,
  [description][dbo].[DescriptionString]
)
ON [PRIMARY]

When a column is defined with a UDT, you can't use the ALTER TABLE command shown in case 1 to change the collation. Doing so will generate an error like this:

Msg 2715, Level 16, State 6, Line 1
Column, parameter, or variable #12:
Cannot find data type DescriptionString.

You need to use a workaround to change the collation of a table that contains a column whose data type is a UDT. The workaround is best explained with an example. Suppose you need to change the collation of the Country table, whose Description column uses the DescriptionString UDT. First, you need to create another table, Tmp_Country, using a standard data type for the Description column:

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Tmp_Country]
(
  [isocode] [char] (2) NOT NULL,
  [fullname] [varchar] (100) NULL,
  [description] [varchar] (1000) NULL
)
ON PRIMARY

Next, you need to copy all the rows from the Country table to the Tmp_Country table, then delete the Country table:

IF EXISTS(SELECT * FROM dbo.Country)
  EXEC('INSERT INTO
    dbo.Tmp_Country(isocode,fullname,description)
    SELECT isocode,fullname,description
    FROM dbo.Country WITH(HOLDLOCK TABLOCKX)')

DROP TABLE dbo.Country

At this point, you can change the collation in the Tmp_Country table using the ALTER TABLE command:

ALTER TABLE dbo.Tmp_Country
  ALTER COLUMN [fullname] varchar(100)
  COLLATE Latin1_General_CS_AS NULL
ALTER TABLE dbo.Tmp_Country
  ALTER COLUMN [description] varchar(1000)
  COLLATE Latin1_General_CS_AS NULL

Once that's done, you can re-create the Country table using the DescriptionString UDT for the Description column:

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Country]
(
  [isocode] [char] (2) NOT NULL,
  [fullname] [dbo].[NameString] NULL,
  [description][dbo].[DescriptionString]
)
ON [PRIMARY]

Finally, you can copy all rows from the Tmp_Country table to the Country table, then delete the Tmp_Country table:

IF EXISTS(SELECT * FROM dbo.Tmp_Country)
  EXEC('INSERT INTO
    dbo.Country(isocode,fullname,description)
    SELECT isocode,fullname,description
    FROM dbo.Country WITH(HOLDLOCK TABLOCKX)')

DROP TABLE dbo.Tmp_Country

Fortunately, you can use SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) to change a column's data type, making this workaround much easier to accomplish. SSMS will automatically generate the scripts to change it. If you analyze the scripts, you'll see that a temporary table is created and the data is transferred.

Step 6: Change the Collation of the Views

Views can have their own collations, so their collations need to be checked and changed if needed. Having the wrong collation can dramatically change the resulting sort order or even the result itself. For example, joins between Unicode and non-Unicode values using Windows collations give different results than the same joins using SQL Server collations.

To change the collation of a view, you need to drop and re-create the view. Remember to reassign the rights granted to the view afterward.

Step 7: Rebuild the Indexes

The last step is to rebuild all indexes using your maintenance plan or a rebuilding job. If you followed my recommendation in step 3, you also need to re-create all the dropped objects at this point.

A Worthwhile Process