Oracle provides six data types for storing LOBs:
CLOB and LONG for large fixed-width character data
NCLOB for large fixed-width national character set data
BLOB and LONG RAW for storing unstructured data
BFILE for storing unstructured data in operating system files
LONG and LONG RAW data types were previously used for unstructured data such as binary images documents or geographical information and are primarily provided for backward compatibility. These data types are superseded by the LOB data types. LOB at types are distinct from LONG and LONG RAW and they are not interchangeable. LOBs will not support the LONG application programming interface (API) and vice versa.
