NUMERIC Scale & Precision required in future versions?

[TallOne]

Although I haven’t been able to find the MS documentation, I read that in future versions of SQL Server, scale and precision will be required for data type NUMERIC. Has anyone read or heard about this?

 

[RiverGuy]

Haven't heard of it, but I've never created a column without it. If I don't want any decimal places, I'll use one of the integer types.

 

[sqlfable]

Technically you are required to have a valid scale,precision. You get around entering it by the defaults.

Although I have yet to read of removal of the default values I wish they would to promote better design and coding methods

Same rules apply to things like not stating length in varchar etc..

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms190476.aspx

 

[gmmastros]

In my experience, developers often use NUMERIC as a replacement for Int. The default precision and scale for Numeric is 18,0. Notice the 0. This does not allow for fractional values.

This would allow for values ranging from -999,999,999,999,999,999 to 999,999,999,999,999,999

It takes 9 bytes to store a Numeric(18,0) but only 4 bytes to store an int. Of course, Numeric(18,0) can store a larger number than an int, but you can easily use a big int too.

Declare @Blah Numeric
Set @Blah = 1

SELECT SQL_VARIANT_PROPERTY(@Blah, 'BaseType') AS [Base Type], 
       SQL_VARIANT_PROPERTY(@Blah, 'Precision') AS [PRECISION],
       SQL_VARIANT_PROPERTY(@Blah, 'Scale') AS [Scale],
       SQL_VARIANT_PROPERTY(@Blah, 'TotalBytes') As TotalBytes

-George

"The great things about standards is that there are so many to choose from." - Fortune Cookie Wisdom

 

[TallOne]

Thanks for the responses. At some point in my career I picked up the habit of using
DECLARE @MyVAR AS NUMERIC(18,0)
my supervisor asked me to start using
DECLARE @MyVAR NUMERIC
unless I knew something that he didn't. I told him that I had heard it would be required in future versions as well as possibly use more memory. So here I am looking to see if anyone else had heard about it...

Thanks

 

[sqlfable]

Your supervisor isn't the best lead. Best advice you can get at this point is don't pick up bad habits from peers. Even if they are in higher positions.

 

[gmmastros]

I don't see anything about it here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms143729.aspx

-George

"The great things about standards is that there are so many to choose from." - Fortune Cookie Wisdom