UTF8 Encoding issue in Joomla Module

Question

I have this code that works fine outside of Joomla, but once I put it into a Joomla Module, it does not properly encode. See

"Cura�ao - - converted:Cura?ao"

as an example. This should be

"Cura�ao - - converted:Curaçao"

when encoded properly.

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
<?php
error_reporting(E_ERROR);
header('Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8' );
$includes_url = $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] . "/Joomla33/_Leagues/_includes/";
ini_set('default_charset', 'utf-8');
include_once($includes_url. "php/OpenDB.php");

$query = "SELECT * FROM chasiv_timezones.country ORDER BY country_name ASC";
$result = mysqli_query($conn, $query);   
?>
Country:<select id='country' name='country'>
   <option value=''>-- Select --</option>
   <?php
   while($data = mysqli_fetch_assoc($result)) {
      echo $name = mb_convert_encoding($data['country_name'],'utf8');      
      if($data['country_code'] == $row['country']) { $sel = " selected"; } else { $sel = ""; }
      ?>
      <option value="<?php echo $data['country_code']; ?>" <?php echo $sel; ?>><?php echo $name; ?></option>
      <?php
   }
   ?>   
</select>
<?php
$query = "SELECT * FROM chasiv_timezones.country ORDER BY country_name ASC";
$result = mysqli_query($conn, $query);   
if(!$result) {
   exit("Unable to connect to database to get timezone countries.  SQL:" . $query);
}   

echo "<br />";
mysqli_set_charset($conn, 'utf8mb4');

while($data = mysqli_fetch_assoc($result)) {      
   echo $data['country_name'] . '  - ' . mb_check_encoding($data['country_name'],'utf8');
   if(!mb_check_encoding($data['country_name'],'utf8')) {
      echo "    - converted:" . mb_convert_encoding($data['country_name'],'utf8') . '<Br />';
   } else {
      echo "<br />";
   }
}
?>

Answer 1

I found the issue. This line:

mysqli_set_charset($conn, 'utf8mb4');

Needs to be before the mysqli_query and not after.