The problem exists, and the patch works, but i have a question about it.

Let me explain:

itemtypes are also accessed through C4/Koha.pm, sub GetItemTypes that is 
sub GetItemTypes {

    # returns a reference to a hash of references to itemtypes...
    my %itemtypes;
    my $dbh   = C4::Context->dbh;
    my $query = qq|
        SELECT *
        FROM   itemtypes
    |;
    my $sth = $dbh->prepare($query);
    $sth->execute;
    while ( my $IT = $sth->fetchrow_hashref ) {
        $itemtypes{ $IT->{'itemtype'} } = $IT;
    }
    return ( \%itemtypes );
}

As a reminder, the sub in C4/ItemTypes.pm is :

sub all {
    my ($class) = @_;
    my $dbh = C4::Context->dbh;
    return    map { $class->new($_) }    @{$dbh->selectall_arrayref(
        # The itemtypes table is small enough for
        # `SELECT *` to be harmless.
        "SELECT * FROM itemtypes ORDER BY description",
        { Slice => {} },
    )};
}


I don't see any "utf8::encode" in the GetItemTypes, the sub is quite similar, except one uses selectall_arrayref, the other fetchrow_hashref. Why the hell is it needed to utf8::encode the ItemTypes.pm and not the GetItemTypes ?

What I fear is that the utf8::encode solves this problem, but another problem will happen later.
If anyone has an idea...

This bug is still here in Koha 3.4.4. The patch still apply and should be included in HEAD en 3.4 branches.

Created attachment 5772 [details] [review]
Bug 6371 Item Types description not properly displayed if not pure ASCII

In several places, C4::ItemType module is used to retrieve item types
and their description. If the description text contains non-ASCII
characters, those characters are not properly displayed.

This bug can be seen in:

  - 4xx plugin of a UNIMARC DB
  - Home > Admin > Item circulation alerts
  - others?...

Signed-off-by: Katrin Fischer <Katrin.Fischer.83@web.de>
  - Fixes display probems in circulation alerts and 4xx UNIMARC plugin
  - display in other places looks ok with and without patch

Signed-off-by: Paul Poulain <paul.poulain@biblibre.com>

QA comment
  * good test plan
  * small patch
  * no code comment to do, it's only a few lines long
  * works as expected

=> passed QA

Pushed please test

> Pushed please test

It works now in HEAD.