Getting wrong charset output from AJAX - php

Question

When I want to printout the output of jQuery AJAX, which has been recived from server. It doesn't show the right charset. What I want exactly is to get Š instead I am getting ?. All files script.js and server php proceed.php are saved in UTF-8 and set in UTF-8. Database is set to UTF-8 as well. I've tried most of the things.
In .js file for AJAX:
$.ajaxSetup({
url: "proceed.php", //file to procces data
ContentType : 'charset=UTF-8', // tried here
global: false,
type: "POST",
dataType: "html"
});
In .php file:
mysql_query("SET NAMES utf8");
$output = utf8_decode($sql_result);
All possible combinations.
UPDATE:
I've tried all proposed method in all possible variations and by using them, I don't get any response from server. The only time I get at least soem response is with settings mentioned above - literally. Setting AJAX dataType: "text/html" nor dataType: "application/html" doesn't help.
CODE:
PHP
if(!empty($_POST['select_had'])){
$zem = $_POST['select_had'];
$vysledek = mysql_query("SELECT typ_hadanky, jazyk FROM hlavolam RIGHT JOIN hadanka ON hlavolam.id_hlavolamu=hadanka.id_hlavolamu WHERE zeme_puvodu='$zem'");
$out = "";
while ($zaznam = mysql_fetch_array($vysledek)) {
$zaz = $zaznam['jazyk'];
$out .= "<option>".$zaz."</option>";
}
$vys = utf8_decode($out);
echo $vys;
}
jQuery:
$("#sel_had_zem").change(function(){
var select_had = $("#sel_had_zem option:selected").text();
console.log(select_had);
$.ajax({
data:{'select_had':select_had},
success: function(data){
console.log(data);
$("#sel_had_jaz option").nextAll().remove();
$("#sel_had_jaz").append(data);
},
error: function(){
alert('No server response');
}
});
});

Answer 1

You'll need to set the charset in your MySQL connection and not in the MySQL query. If you're using MySQLi then you can mysqli_set_charset() built-in PHP function. However, if you're using PDO then you can use it like this:
new PDO('mysql:host=localhost;dbname=DBNAME;charset=utf8;', USERNAME, PASSWORD);
You can find more information about the mysqli_set_charset() function here:
http://www.w3schools.com/php/func_mysqli_set_charset.asp
Note: Please, also ensure you've added the <meta charset="UTF-8"> in your HEAD tag.

Answer 2

Try changing the following..
dataType: 'html'
to
dataType: 'application/html'
keep
contentType: 'charset=utf8'
and add <?php header('Content-Type: application/html; charset=utf8'); ?> to the top of your pages.
For error reporting put error_reporting(E_ALL); at the top of your page as well. If any errors arise, post the code for that line, and post the error message in your OP post.
For your error
Resource interpreted as Document but transferred with MIME type application/html
In your request header, you have sent Content-Type: html which means that you'd like to interpret the response as HTML. Now if even server send you PDF files, your browser tries to understand it as HTML. That's the problem.
So need some info as to what exactly you're trying to send and what is the recieving end doing with this data?

Answer 3

You want to set the output from the PHP-page to UTF-8 and correct MIME-type:
mysql_query("SET NAMES utf8");
header( 'Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8' );
echo $sql_result;
exit;
This should fix the issue!