Database Engine International Enhancements
The collations and character sets of the Database Engine and its interfaces now include support supplementary characters and GB18030-encoded characters.
International Enhancements
New Collations and Collation Versions
SQL Server has added a number of new collations that use the Microsoft Windows 2003 sorting tables. In addition, a number of Asian collations have been updated with new versions to support comparisons of supplementary characters.
For more information, see Collation Settings in Setup.
New Code Point Comparison Binary Flag
The BIN2 sort order suffix can be used for binary sorting of Unicode data. The BIN2 suffix is based on a true code-point-to-code-point comparison of Unicode strings.
For more information, see Windows Collation Sorting Styles.
GB18030 Support
GB18030 is a character set used in the People's Republic of China. The Database Engine recognizes GB18030 characters received from applications and stores them as Unicode characters.
For more information, see GB18030 Characters.
Supplementary Character Support
The SQL Server 2005 Database Engine introduces support for supplementary characters that encompass Extension B of the Unicode standard.
For more information, see Supplementary Characters.
Complex Script Support
If the computer running a Database Engine application supports complex scripts, the Database Engine supports storing, manipulating, and returning complex scripts. One form of complex scripts is languages, such as Indic or Thai, in which the shapes of letters change depending on their position and surrounding characters. The other form of complex scripts is bi-directional scripts, where parts of the script are read right-to-left and others are read left-to-right.
For more information, see Complex Script Support.