Re: Assigning Field Size

From: Jonathan Gennick <gennick_at_worldnet.att.net>
Date: 1998/06/13
Message-ID: <6lsqht$nvt@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net>#1/1

On Thu, 11 Jun 1998 20:23:47 +0100,
sprgrvr_at_worldaccess.REMOVE.nl (Super Grover) wrote:

>But I wonder what the effect is of not assigning a fixed field
>size/precision to a field. Will it affect performance or something? Does
>anyone know?

I am not aware of any performance implications. Lack of a size and precision gives you a floating point value instead of a fixed point value. You might run into problems with computed values having fractional amounts that you weren't expecting. The result of 2/3 for example, will be different depending on how many digits of decimal precision you allow.

If you would prefer fixed length NUMBER fields, you can always use the ALTER TABLE command from SQL*Plus to change things.

ALTER TABLE whatever

 	MODIFY (col_name NUMBER(9,2),
                   col_name2 NUMBER(9,2));

regards,

Jonathan Gennick Received on Sat Jun 13 1998 - 00:00:00 CDT