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Modifying a Column You can modify a column definition by using the ALTER TABLE statement with the MODIFY clause. Column modification can include changes to a column’s data type, size, and default value. Guidelines You can increase the width or precision of a numeric column. You can increase the width of numeric or character columns. You can decrease the width of a column only if the column contains only null values or if the table has no rows. You can change the data type only if the column contains null values. You can convert a CHAR column to the VARCHAR2 data type or convert a VARCHAR2 column to the CHAR data type only if the column contains null values or if you do not change the size. A change to the default value of a column affects only subsequent insertions to the table. Dropping a Column You can drop a column from a table by using the ALTER TABLE statement with the DROP COLUMN clause. This is a feature available in Oracle8i and later. Guidelines The column may or may not contain data. Using the ALTER TABLE statement, only one column can be dropped at a time. The table must have at least one column remaining in it after it is altered. Once a column is dropped, it cannot be recovered. Instructor Note When a column is dropped from a table, any other columns in that table that are marked with the SET UNUSED option are dropped too. The SET UNUSED Option The SET UNUSED option marks one or more columns as unused so that they can be dropped when the demand on system resources is lower. This is a feature available in Oracle8i and later. Specifying this clause does not actually remove the target columns from each row in the table (that is, it does not restore the disk space used by these columns). Therefore, the response time is faster than if you executed the DROP clause. Unused columns are treated as if they were dropped, even though their column data remains in the table’s rows. After a column has been marked as unused, you have no access to that column. A S