Charset problem with RH8

 
Dear Sirs,
 
I'm a RH Linux 8.0 user (Pschyche).
 
I just like to know how to upgrade a Redhat Linux 8 installation. How to
add packages without reseting any parameter (mainly all the network
parameters).
 
More explication : i've installed Apache Tomcat 4 with JDK 1.4.0. My
system is stable (thanks) and my Tomcat Webserver works properly
(J2EE/JSP).
I also use MySQL with RH8 (the bugged MySQL included with RH8 but I've
the solution for resolving it, the inno-db parameter).
 
Some french characters are not visible on all my Webpages; ie : for
"éxamen", we have "?xamen", etc etc. What can I do ? These characters
comes from the MySQL database. In mysql, i can see it clearly because
it's correct. Other french characters which are not in the database are
visible correctly.
 
I've performed another full installation of RH8 on another pc with the
same MySQL and Tomcat parameters and and i've not the problem. I presume
that some locales packages (or languages packages or charset packages)
must be installed on my first installation like Latin1, Wester1252, etc
etc.
 
Can you help me please ? How to perform this ? What packages ? How to
turn my personnalized installation of RH8 to full installation without
reseting anything.