Oracle-L: Re: char vs. varchar in a data warehouse

From: <Jared.Still_at_radisys.com>
Date: Wed, 05 Jun 2002 09:48:31 -0800
Message-ID: <F001.00475455.20020605094831@fatcity.com>

Lisa,

The only reason for a space in a char(1) would be if it were inserted explicitly.

Inserting a NULL into a char column does not result in any padding.

That said, I don't see any problem with varchar2(1), other than the extra 1 or 2 bytes ( can't remember which ) that are used in the header.

Jared

YTTRI Lisa <lisa.yttri_at_cnh.com>
Sent by: root_at_fatcity.com
06/05/2002 08:53 AM
Please respond to ORACLE-L

        To:     Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L <ORACLE-L_at_fatcity.com>
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        Subject:        char vs. varchar in a data warehouse

Hi -

We are in the process of building a data warehouse and data stores. This will be built on a Sun Solaris (2.8) machine running Oracle 9i R1. Estimates are approximately 180GB.

The developers have defined most of their small character fields as varchar2
- even the ones of size 1! They tell me that if the column does not have a
value, they do not want to have to deal with a 'space' when manipulating that value.

Does this make sense? Should I be pursuing this further or shouldn't I care
as the DBA?

Lisa

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Author: YTTRI Lisa
INET: lisa.yttri_at_cnh.com

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