python - Database agnostic way to say I want a column to be UTF-8 in SqlAlchemy? -

python - Database agnostic way to say I want a column to be UTF-8 in SqlAlchemy? -

i noticed mysql database isn't set utf-8 default. latin1_swedish_ci collation selected instead.

so naturally encountered user reported bug application didn't back upwards special characters. went , made sure app handled utf-8 right, wrote test, , sure plenty worked fine in-memory sqlite not production mysql.the solution seem sqlalchemy documentation pass collation on column:

column = db.column(db.string(500, collation='utf8_general_ci'))

sadly, causes unit tests based around sqlite fail -- utf8_general_ci isn't supported encoding sqlite. mysql specific.

sqlite seems fine utf-8 without specifying collation. can , test mysql, in memory sqlite database much faster , straight-forward testing alternative spot tests. prioritize ease of testing, getting testing sqlite big priority me.

other things i've tried

i've tried adding

charset=utf8&use_unicode=1

to connect string. i've used db.unicode instead of db.string. seemed create no difference.

question

is there straight-forward , database agnostic way through sqlalchemy indicate column should encoded utf-8?

what solved problem alter collation on table __table_args__:

class foo(base): __tablename__ = "foo" __table_args__ = {'mysql_collate': 'utf8_general_ci'} ... column = db.column(db.string(500))

sqlite happily ignores mysql setting. mysql picks appropriately.

python mysql sqlite utf-8 sqlalchemy