Using iconv to convert from UTF-16LE to UTF-8

linux utf-16le
laitha0 picture laitha0 · Jun 25, 2013 · Viewed 47.5k times · Source

Hi I am trying to convert some log files from a Microsoft SQL server, but the files are encoded using UTf-16LE and iconv does not seem to be able to convert them.

I am doing: 

iconv -f UTF-16LE -t UTF-8 <filename>

I also tried to delete any carriage returns from the end of the line if there are any, but that did not fix it either. If I save it using gedit that works, but this is not a viable solution since I have hundreds of those files.

EDIT: Please see the new answer for the missing option

Answer

laitha0 picture laitha0 · Jun 25, 2013

I forgot the -o switch!

The final command is :

iconv -f UTF-16LE -t UTF-8 <filename> -o <new-filename>

Related questions

How do I find all files containing specific text on Linux?

I'm trying to find a way to scan my entire Linux system for all files containing a specific string of text. Just to clarify, I'm looking for text within the file, not in the file name. When I was looking …

Read More
How to change permissions for a folder and its subfolders/files in one step?

I would like to change permissions of a folder and all its sub folders and files in one step (command) in Linux. I have already tried the below command but it works only for the mentioned folder: chmod 775 /opt/lampp/…

Read More
How can I recursively find all files in current and subfolders based on wildcard matching?

How can I recursively find all files in current and subfolders based on wildcard matching?

Read More