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The article explains that low-cardinality status columns in Oracle should be designed carefully because the choice of representation can significantly affect storage, row migration, and index performance. It compares descriptive strings, numbers, single characters, NULL, and BOOLEAN, highlighting NULL for the common/default state as particularly space-efficient and useful when indexing rare, actionable statuses. Neil Chandler's DB Blog

https://chandlerdba.com/2026/08/24/status-columns-in-oracle/