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I'm trying to connect to a local instance of MySQL 8.0 using FME Desktop 2018.  When I test the database connection I get the following error:

Opening MYSQL_DB reader for dataset 'test1'

Error connecting to MYSQL database('127.0.0.1','test1'): 'Can't initialize character set unknown (path: compiled_in)'

I can successfully: 

1. Connect to a remote MySQL database in FME Desktop.

2. Connect to my local test1 table in QGIS (using the same credentials).

3. Connect to my local test1 table using MySQL Workbench.

Googling seems to suggest the error is related to the database or table collation, but I've confirmed that the collation settings are the same for my local database and remote database.  Besides even if they were different, why can I connect using QGIS.

Any ideas would be much appreciated.

I resolved this issue by downgrading my version of MySQL Server to 5.7.22 (the version I had initially tried with was 8.0). Which prompts the question, is there a compatability issue between FME Workbench 2018 and MySQL Server 8.0, or is a custom setup of MySQL needed?


I resolved this issue by downgrading my version of MySQL Server to 5.7.22 (the version I had initially tried with was 8.0). Which prompts the question, is there a compatability issue between FME Workbench 2018 and MySQL Server 8.0, or is a custom setup of MySQL needed?

We are hitting this same issue as well. Is there any concise information on whether or not mysql 8 is supported and to what level? In addition is FME able to work around the swapping of lat & long thing that mysql has an issue with?


@bfusa, We recently updated FME but we've not done all formal testing yet. The updates are in FME 2020.1 beta and you could download the latest beta at https://www.safe.com/support/downloads/#beta and see if this works for you. Please report back if it does. Thanks for posting.


@bfusa, @sebastianblock,

We can confirm that MySQL 8 is now supported as of b2020.1.20553. This is still beta as of this posting. FME 2020.1 will be out during the summer of 2020. https://www.safe.com/support/downloads/#beta


@bfusa, We recently updated FME but we've not done all formal testing yet. The updates are in FME 2020.1 beta and you could download the latest beta at https://www.safe.com/support/downloads/#beta and see if this works for you. Please report back if it does. Thanks for posting.

Thanks for getting back to us! Will check it out.


@bfusa, @sebastianblock,

We can confirm that MySQL 8 is now supported as of b2020.1.20553. This is still beta as of this posting. FME 2020.1 will be out during the summer of 2020. https://www.safe.com/support/downloads/#beta

Just a comment to express my appreciation! 🙂 I was about to post the same question, only to find out you guys already provided support a month ago. Amazing!


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