C Configuring Oracle Database Companion CD Globalization Support

This appendix describes the following Globalization Support topics:

Installing and Using Oracle Components in Different Languages
Configuring Locale and Character Sets by Using the NLS_LANG Environment Variable

C.1 Installing and Using Oracle Components in Different Languages

This section describes the following procedures:

Running Oracle Universal Installer in Different Languages
Using Oracle Components in Different Languages

C.1.1 Running Oracle Universal Installer in Different Languages

Oracle Universal Installer runs by default in the selected language of your operating system. You can also run Oracle Universal Installer in the following languages:

Brazilian Portuguese
German
Japanese
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
French
Italian
Korean
Spanish

To run Oracle Universal Installer in a different language, change the language in which your operating system is running before you run Oracle Universal Installer.

C.1.2 Using Oracle Components in Different Languages

You can specify the language in which you want to use Oracle components (such as Oracle Net Configuration Assistant and Oracle Database Configuration Assistant). Note that this does not change the language in which Oracle Universal Installer is run. For the Oracle component to run in the selected language, it must be the same as the language set for your operating system. You can change your operating system language in the Regional Settings window from the Control Panel.

To use components in different languages:

Start Oracle Universal Installer.
On the Select Installation Type screen, click Product Languages.
On the Language Selection screen, select the language in which you want to use Oracle components from the Available Languages field.
Use the > arrow to move the selected language to the Selected Languages field, and then click OK.
Select the products you want, and then click Next.

After installation is complete, the dialog box text, messages, and online Help for the installed components are displayed in the language you select.

C.2 Configuring Locale and Character Sets by Using the NLS_LANG Environment Variable

Oracle provides Globalization Support that enables users to interact with a database in their preferred locale and character set settings. Setting the NLS_LANG environment variable specifies locale behavior for Oracle software. It sets the language and territory used by the client application and the database. It also sets the character set for entering and displaying data by a client program, such as SQL*Plus.

The NLS_LANG environment variable uses the following format:

NLS_LANG=language_territory.characterset

In this format:

language_territory specifies the language used for displaying Oracle messages, sorting, day names, and month names
territory specifies the conventions for default date, monetary and numeric formats
characterset specifies the encoding used by the client application

In most cases, this is the Oracle character set that corresponds to the character set of the user terminal or the operating system.

The NLS_LANG environment variable is set as a local environment variable for the shell on all UNIX-based platforms. For example, if the operating system locale setting is en_US.UTF-8, then the corresponding NLS_LANG environment variable should be set to AMERICAN_AMERICA.AL32UTF8.

Operating System Locale	`NLS_LANG` Values
French (France)	FRENCH_FRANCE.WE8ISO8859P15 FRENCH_FRANCE.WE8ISO8859P1 FRENCH_FRANCE.WE8MSWIN1252 FRENCH_FRANCE.AL32UTF8
Japanese (Japan)	JAPANESE_JAPAN.JA16EUC JAPANESE_JAPAN.JA16SJIS JAPANESE_JAPAN.AL32UTF8