How to implement decimal and number in Oracle?

11 months ago

Liam

1 minute

In Oracle, both DECIMAL and NUMBER can be used to represent floating-point numbers, but there are some differences in their internal implementations.

DECIMAL is a precise data type that does not introduce any rounding errors when storing data. It is commonly used for financial data or other scenarios requiring accurate calculations. In Oracle, DECIMAL type can be defined using NUMBER(precision, scale), where precision represents the total number of digits and scale represents the number of decimal places.

For example, DECIMAL(10, 2) represents a DECIMAL type with 10 total digits and 2 decimal places.

On the other hand, NUMBER is an approximate data type that may introduce rounding errors when storing data. NUMBER type is typically used in general numerical calculation scenarios. In Oracle, NUMBER type can be defined using NUMBER(p, s), where p represents the total number of digits and s represents the number of decimal places.

For example, NUMBER(10, 2) represents a NUMBER data type with 10 digits and 2 decimal places.

In general, DECIMAL is suitable for situations that require high precision calculations, while NUMBER is suitable for general numerical computing scenarios.