DOCUMENT:Q178875  06-JAN-1998  [vbwin]
TITLE   :FILE: ORALONG.EXE: Use RDO with Oracle LONG/LONG RAW Datatypes
PRODUCT :Microsoft Visual Basic for Windows
PROD/VER:WINDOWS:5.0
OPER/SYS:WINDOWS
KEYWORDS:vb5all

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The information in this article applies to:

 - Microsoft Visual Basic Enterprise Edition for Windows, version 5.0
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SUMMARY
=======

The "Working with LONG, LONG RAW and VARCHAR2(2000) Oracle Datatypes" white
paper is intended to clarify the handling of the Oracle datatypes LONG,
LONG RAW and VARCHAR2(2000) when they are used with Microsoft Visual Basic
and Remote Data Objects (RDO). A sample project is attached that
illustrates storing and retrieving these datatypes. The project uses
straight Visual Basic 5.0 RDO code to store and retrieve this data as well
as using stored procedures.

NOTE: It is not recommended to store BLOB or Long Text data in a table. A
more efficient way is to store file pointers in the table that will locate
the actual files. Other Microsoft white papers go into detail on this
method.

MORE INFORMATION
================

The following file is available for download from the Microsoft
Software Library:

 ~ OraLong.exe

For more information about downloading files from the Microsoft Software
Library, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

   ARTICLE-ID: Q119591
   TITLE     : How to Obtain Microsoft Support Files from Online Services

OraLong.exe is a self-extracting file that will, after execution, produce a
Microsoft WORD 7.0 document (Ora_Long.DOC), an HTML document (Ora_Long.HTM)
and a Microsoft Visual Basic 5.0 project named Oracle_Long.VPB. The
document thoroughly describes the Visual Basic application included and
gives pointers about using Oracle LONG, LONG RAW and VARCHAR(2000)
datatypes.

Also included in the file list is a .txt file named Ora_Long.OSP that has
all the Oracle PL/SQL scripts necessary to support the Visual Basic
application. Run Ora_Long.OSP from Oracle SQL*PLUS to create the table and
stored procedures on your Oracle server.

After downloading OraLong.exe, place it in a new folder and run the file to
extract the supporting files for this white paper.

In addition to Visual Basic, you will need to have MDAC v1.5 installed.

For additional information about acquiring and installing MDAC, please see
the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

   ARTICLE-ID: Q175018
   TITLE     : HOWTO: Acquire and Install the Microsoft Oracle ODBC
               Driver v2.0

Additional query words: oracle long raw

(c) Microsoft Corporation 1998, All Rights Reserved.
Contributions by Ron Nelson, Microsoft Corporation

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Keywords          : vb5all
Technology        : kbodbc
Version           : WINDOWS:5.0
Platform          : WINDOWS
Solution Type     : kbfile

=============================================================================

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