title: MySQL varchar (255) limitation & Anomaly
body: <p>i have defined a column in my mysql database as : </p>
  
  <pre><code>ALTER TABLE `my_table` CHANGE `desc` `desc` VARCHAR( 255 ) CHARACTER SET latin1 COLLATE latin1_swedish_ci NOT NULL
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But when i enter a text from my front end to insert into the table , after the size of column data reaches 233 it <strong>truncates further text added</strong> ie text beyond 233 character is not saved !!</p>
  
  <p>i tried changing size of column to VARCHAR(511) but achieved no success.</p>
  
  <p>i counted the nos of characters using php <code>strlen()</code> and it revealed 233 characters</p>
  
  <p>Why is MySQL doing this , and how can i save the text ?</p>