Common Bijoy Conversion Errors and How to Fix Them

✅ Step 1: Verify Source Format

1. Open the original file in MS Word or Notepad
2. Change the font to SutonnyMJ or Bijoy Bayanno
3. If text looks correct, it's Bijoy ✅
4. If still garbled, it might be another encoding

✅ Step 2: Try Different Converters

Some converters handle edge cases better:

• Try Bijoy.ConverterAZ.com (best accuracy)
• Test with a small sample first
• Compare results from 2-3 different tools

✅ Step 3: Convert in Smaller Chunks

If large documents fail, try converting paragraph by paragraph to identify where the corruption starts.

✅ Use a Comprehensive Converter

Not all converters support all Bijoy characters. Bijoy.ConverterAZ.com includes mappings for:

• All standard Bijoy keyboard characters
• Vowel marks (স্বরচিহ্ন)
• Consonant conjuncts (যুক্তাক্ষর)
• Special symbols and punctuation

✅ Check for Zero-Width Characters

Bengali Unicode uses zero-width joiners (ZWJ):

1. After conversion, copy text to a Unicode-aware editor
2. Enable "Show invisible characters"
3. Verify ZWJ characters are present where needed

✅ Manual Fix for Missing Characters

If specific characters consistently go missing:

1. Identify the missing character in the original Bijoy text
2. Note its Unicode equivalent (use Google or a Bengali Unicode table)
3. Use find-and-replace to add it back after conversion

✅ Verify Conversion Direction

Double-check that you selected "Bijoy → Unicode" not "Unicode → Bijoy". This is the #1 cause of incorrect mappings.

✅ Use a Trusted Converter

Some free converters have outdated or incorrect mapping tables. Stick to reputable tools:

• Bijoy.ConverterAZ.com - regularly updated
• Ekushey Project tools
• Official BSBK converters

✅ Test with Known Sample

Before converting large documents:

1. Type "আমি বাংলায় গান গাই" in Bijoy
2. Convert it
3. Verify it reads correctly in Unicode
4. If test passes, proceed with your full document

✅ Find and Replace Double Spaces

After conversion in your text editor:

1. Press Ctrl+H (Windows) or Cmd+F (Mac)
2. Find: " " (two spaces)
3. Replace: " " (one space)
4. Click "Replace All" multiple times until no more replacements

✅ Fix Line Break Issues

To normalize line endings:

1. Open in Notepad++ or VS Code
2. View → Show Symbol → Show End of Line
3. Edit → EOL Conversion → Windows (CRLF) or Unix (LF)
4. Save the file

✅ Remove Zero-Width Spaces

If words stick together or have invisible gaps:

Find: \u200B (zero-width space)
Replace: (nothing)

✅ Separate Bijoy and Unicode Text

1. Open in MS Word
2. Select all text, change font to SutonnyMJ
3. Parts that look correct are Bijoy ✅
4. Parts that look wrong are already Unicode ✅
5. Manually separate them into two sections
6. Convert only the Bijoy sections
7. Merge everything back together

✅ Use Smart Converters

Some advanced converters (like Bijoy.ConverterAZ.com) can detect mixed encoding and skip already-Unicode text automatically.

✅ Save as UTF-8 with BOM

For .txt files in Notepad:

1. File → Save As
2. Encoding: Select "UTF-8"
3. Click Save

For VS Code/Notepad++:

1. Encoding → Convert to UTF-8
2. Or: Encoding → UTF-8 with BOM (for Windows compatibility)

✅ Recover Corrupted Files

If file won't open:

1. Try opening in a different program (WordPad, LibreOffice, Google Docs)
2. Open in a text editor to see raw content
3. Copy visible text to a new file
4. Re-save with proper encoding

✅ Use Download Instead of Copy-Paste

When using online converters, always click "Download" button instead of copying text manually. This preserves encoding and formatting.

✅ Use "Paste Special" → "Unformatted Text"

In MS Word:

1. Right-click where you want to paste
2. Choose "Paste Special"
3. Select "Unformatted Unicode Text"
4. Click OK

✅ Install Unicode Bengali Fonts

Ensure target application has proper fonts:

• Free fonts: Noto Sans Bengali, Kalpurush, Mukti
• Windows: Install via Control Panel → Fonts
• Mac: Double-click .ttf file → Install Font
• After pasting, change font to a Bengali Unicode font

✅ Use Intermediate Text File

1. Convert your text
2. Paste into Notepad (Windows) or TextEdit (Mac)
3. Save as UTF-8
4. Open the file and copy from there to your final destination

✅ Convert Source Document Instead

Best solution: Find the original Word/text file used to create the PDF, convert that, then re-generate the PDF.

✅ OCR (Optical Character Recognition)

If you only have the PDF:

1. Use Adobe Acrobat Pro or online OCR tools (e.g., OnlineOCR.net)
2. Set language to "Bengali"
3. Extract text (results may be 70-80% accurate)
4. Manually fix OCR errors
5. Then convert Bijoy to Unicode

✅ Manual Retyping (Small Documents)

For short PDFs (1-2 pages), it's often faster to retype the text directly in Unicode than to fight with OCR errors.

✅ Set Database to UTF-8MB4 (MySQL)

-- Create database with UTF8MB4
CREATE DATABASE mydb
CHARACTER SET utf8mb4
COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;

-- Alter existing table
ALTER TABLE mytable
CONVERT TO CHARACTER SET utf8mb4
COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;

-- Alter specific column
ALTER TABLE mytable
MODIFY column_name VARCHAR(255)
CHARACTER SET utf8mb4
COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;

✅ Set Connection Encoding

In your database connection:

-- MySQL
SET NAMES utf8mb4;

-- PostgreSQL
SET CLIENT_ENCODING TO 'UTF8';

-- PHP PDO
$pdo->exec("SET NAMES utf8mb4");

✅ Verify Import File Encoding

For CSV/SQL imports:

1. Save your converted file as UTF-8 (without BOM for MySQL)
2. Verify with: file -i yourfile.csv
3. Should show: charset=utf-8

✅ Add UTF-8 Meta Tag to HTML

<!-- Add this in <head> section -->
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">

✅ Use Bengali Web Fonts

/* In your CSS */
@import url('https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Noto+Sans+Bengali&display=swap');

body {
  font-family: 'Noto Sans Bengali', Arial, sans-serif;
}

✅ Configure Server Headers

For Apache (.htaccess):

AddDefaultCharset UTF-8

For Nginx:

charset utf-8;

✅ Save PHP Files as UTF-8

If using PHP, add at the top of your script:

<?php
header('Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8');
?>