How should I store a GUID in Oracle?

Question

I am coming from the SQL server world where we had uniqueidentifier. Is there an equivalent in oracle? This column will be frequently queried so performance is the key.

Answer 1

There is no uniqueidentifier in Oracle.

You can implement one yourself by using RAW (kind of a pain) or CHAR. Performance on queries that JOIN on a CHAR field will suffer (maybe as much as 40%) in comparison with using an integer.

If you're doing distributed/replicated databases, the performance hit is worth it. Otherwise, just use an integer.