encoding the EUC to utf8 is a breeze.

$string = decode("euc-jp", $string);
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Something's wrong when *decode* is used to *encode*.

UNICODE is a character set, not an encoding. You cannot store something in UNICODE format (as you claim), since there is no such thing. UNICODE characters need to be encoded in order to be stored. utf8 is a particularly convenient *encoding* for storing UNICODE characters.

Perl strings works in a similar way. It actually has two kinds of strings. Strings of bytes, and strings of characters. Encoded strings (euc-jp, utf8, etc) are strings of bytes, whereas strings of characters cannot be stored without first being encoded.

If you wish to store a euc-jp string as utf8, you wish to convert from one encoding to another.

$char_string = decode("euc-jp", $jp_bytes);
$utf8_bytes = encode("utf8", $char_string);
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or (U)

$utf8_bytes = encode("utf8", decode("euc-jp", $jp_bytes));
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or

$utf8_bytes = from_to($jp_bytes, "euc-jp", "utf8");
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or (U)

$char_string = decode("euc-jp", $jp_bytes);
binmode FH, ":encoding(euc-jp)";
print FH $char_string;
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$char_string = decode("euc-jp", $jp_bytes);
$utf8_bytes = encode("utf8", $char_string);
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No, I think the OP's issue is that he's having trouble converting the utf8 encoding (as stored to and fetched from the database) back into "euc-jp", because (for example), maybe that's how the data needs to be displayed.

Converting to utf8_bytes is kind of useless in this context.

Sounds to me likes he wants to do both. I assumed he could figure out that all he needs to do to go in the other direction is to replace euc-jp for utf8 and vice-versa.

$char_string = decode("utf8", $utf8_bytes);
$jp_bytes = encode("euc-jp", $char_string);
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or

$jp_bytes = encode("euc-jp", decode("utf8", $utf8_bytes));
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or

$jp_bytes = from_to($utf8_bytes, "utf8", "euc-jp");
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or

$char_string = decode("utf8", $utf8_bytes);
binmode FH, ":encoding(euc-jp)";
print FH $char_string;
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If so, the problem is probably that when you get the data back from the database, perl doesn't know that it's utf8 anymore, and the encode function will do the wrong thing as a result.

The stuff coming back from the database is a string of "octets" (which happen to constitute valid utf8 data in Japanese), and you need to convert from utf8 octets to euc-jp octets, using the "from_to" function from Encode (I'll tweak the variable names for clarity):

# prepare original data for the database:

$utf8_string = decode( "euc-jp", $euc_string );

# store that to the database, then some time later,
# fetch it back, and convert back to euc-jp:

from_to( $db_octets, "utf8", "euc-jp" );

# now, $db_octets should be readable in an euc-jp display.
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$utf8_string = decode( "utf8", $db_octets );

binmode STDOUT, ":encoding(euc-jp)";

print $utf8_string;
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