PHP4 mysqli with mysql 4.1.7?

Hi, This message is a bit long, but I hope somebody could help me on this issue, thank you . I am using mysql 4.1.0(default-character-set=utf8) with PHP 4.3.3. All tables are using utf8 charset. I can insert, select and display the utf8 character without any problem using PHP, I used the normal mysql_query operation, NOT mysqli. Yes, msqyl_query works well in 4.1.0. Now, I upgraded to 4.1.7(default-character-set=utf8). I use mysql client and I can see all data in 4.1.7 are utf8. However, PHP shows all as ???. >SHOW VARIABLES LIKE '%charset%' >character_set_server utf8 >character_set_system utf8 >character_set_database utf8 >character_set_client utf8 >character_set_connection utf8 >character_set_results utf8 >collation_connection utf8_general_ci >collation_database utf8_general_ci >collation_server utf8_general_ci I struggled for a few days and finally discovered a message in mysql-lists by Marek Lewczuk(UTF-8 problem, 24/5/2004), he has the follwing in his PHP script: mysqli_query($c, "SET CHARACTER SET utf8;"); mysqli_query($c, "SELECT * FROM db"); I have never used mysqli before, and I found it is only avaliable in PHP5. I have several questions to ask: 1. Can I compile PHP4 with mysqli extention? Is there any tricks to do this? 2. Why mysql 4.1 + mysqli is recommended? But not the normal mysql extention? 3. If I upgrade to mysql 4.1.7 + PHP5, I need to rewrite all of my application to use mysqli instead of mysql? Any advise on this issue? 4. I see that we must use mysqli_query($c, "SET CHARACTER SET utf8;"); before any query, can I compile the mysqli extention to use utf8 as default? 5. In http://www.php.net/manual/en/ref.mysql.php I see a note: " If you need charsets other than latin (default), you have to install external (not bundled) libmysql with compiled charset support. " So, it means it is possible to use mysql_query to with utf8? 6. Any reason why I can use mysql_query with 4.1.0 without any problem? I know there are many questions, but I hope somebody could help me. And I believes there are lots of people having the same upgrade issue. if utf8 + 4.1.7 + mysqli_query is a must instead of 4.1.7 + mysql_query, I am sure that there will be lots of problem come up as most PHP applications are using mysql_query only. THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! Francis Mak