Lexicographic Order in Java

Question

How is the lexicographic order defined in Java especially in reference to special characters like !, . and so on?

An examplary order can be fou

Answer 1

In Java it's based on the Unicode value of the string:

http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.4.2/docs/api/java/lang/String.html#compareTo(java.lang.String)

In Oracle, it will depend on the charset you are using on your database. You'll want it to be UTF-8 to have consistent behavior with Java.

To check the character set:

SQL> SELECT parameter, value FROM nls_database_parameters 
     WHERE parameter = 'NLS_CHARACTERSET';

PARAMETER             VALUE 
------------------    ---------------------
NLS_CHARACTERSET      UTF8

If it's not UTF-8, then you can get different comparison behavior depending on which character set your Oracle database is using.