Dennis,

According to my copy of 'A Guide To SQL Standard (Author: C. J. Date), 4th ed, pp292, 
section 19.4"

CHARACTER(n) - fixed length string of exactly n characters (n > 0)
VARYING(n)   - varying length string of up to n characters (n > 0)

So, I guess it is.
Raj
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Rajendra dot Jamadagni at nospamespn dot com
All Views expressed in this email are strictly personal.
QOTD: Any clod can have facts, having an opinion is an art !


-----Original Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2003 11:49 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L


Jonathan
   My understanding is that VARCHAR2 is not even a SQL standard, and some
databases don't handle VARCHAR very efficiently, so if you are trying to
sell a product that can adapt to several databases besides Oracle, you might
stick to CHAR.
   If your application is COBOL-based, using CHAR simplifies things quite a
bit. Especially if you sell your application to many sites that want to use
Oracle underneath but don't have an Oracle DBA, at least not initially. Yeah
it wastes a bit of disk space.

Dennis Williams
DBA
Lifetouch, Inc.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 

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