Re: Question on storing non english character

Thank you Mark.

Is there any downside(may be storage or performance/stats side etc) if by default we create all the new VARCHAR2 columns of table a VARCHAR2(N CHAR) even if the column is going to just hold all english/single byte characters? Asking because, Oracle has not made that N CHAR as default , which would have helped in accepting multilingual characters without modifying column types. So is there any reason for not doing that and thus a negative impact if we do so?

On Wed, Aug 25, 2021 at 8:17 PM Powell, Mark <mark.powell2_at_dxc.com<mailto:mark.powell2_at_dxc.com>> wrote: Last I knew, "Oracle recommends that you leave this initialization parameter undefined or you set it to BYTE." This recommendation can be found in Database Globalization Support Guide. Check your version.

Changing the parameter at the database level can impact existing applications. When creating objects, you can either change the parameter at the session level or code the table column definitions to explicitly specify character instead of BYTE.

Mark Powell
Database Administration
(313) 592-5148

Hello Listers, We are getting some requirements in which many of the attributes in our database may need to cater to non english/multi byte characters. Currently we have the defaults setup as bytes at the database level. Which means if we create any attribute with varchar2(N) it defaults to varchar2(N bytes). And existing attributes are defined the same way , say e.g varchar2(N bytes). so they have to be varchar2(N char) to work without fail.

My question is , if there exists any downside if we set it(CHAR) as default at the database level? or say by default create all the new table columns as VARCHAR2(N CHAR)?