String literals

String literals are sequences of characters enclosed in single quotes (') or double quotes (").

obclient> SET sql_mode = 'ANSI_QUOTES';
obclient> SELECT @@sql_mode;

String literals are divided into two types:

• Binary string. The unit is bytes, and the comparison is based on bytes. The character set and collation are binary.

• Non-binary string. The unit is characters, and the comparison is based on characters (some character sets support multi-byte characters). It has various character sets other than binary and collations compatible with the character set.

Use the COLLATE clause to specify the character set and collation for string literals:

[_charset_name]'string' [COLLATE collation_name]

In a string, an escape character is a sequence that starts with a backslash \ and represents a special meaning. Escape characters are case-sensitive. For example, \b represents a backspace, but \B represents B.

The following table lists all escape characters: