Oracle Data Types

Oracle Data Types

A database is a big help in organizing and accessing data. Through this, it’s easier to store data, faster to search for information needed on the database and data updates are also quicker. Imagine if a long list of data needs to be saved, accessed and updated using record books. You’ll have record books piling on your office. If you need to access any information, you need to find the specific record book you need and browse through the pages which takes a lot of time and effort. With a database saved on the computer, everything can be done with just a click of the mouse. Oracle is one of the programs used in creating database and each item on the database has corresponding Oracle data type.

It’s important to be familiar with the Oracle data types so that you’ll know which type to use on specific columns or rows. For example, if you have an inventory database and one column is for item number and another column is for item description, the column under item number should only accept numbers and the column under item description may accept alphabets or alphanumeric combination. There are different Oracle data types that you can use in creating a database.

Numeric

This data type is used to store numbers including zero, positive and negative numbers, fixed numbers and floating numbers with up to 38 digits. These numbers can be written as NUMBER(p,s), NUMBER(p) and FLOAT [(p)]. P is the precision and S is the scale.

Date

This data type can store not only the date and time but also century, minute and second. Timestamp is also included under this data type.

Character

Character data type is used for storing characters with fixed length up to 255 characters or storing large amount of data up to 2G. These can be written as CHAR, NCHAR, VARCHAR2 and NCHAR2.

There are more Oracle data types that you can use that come with the software. You may also define your own data type with Oracle. If you want to learn more about these data types and how to use Oracle, you may find helpful information and tutorials online.