Predefined data types

The database server provides the predefined data types, just as it provides the fundamental data types. However, the predefined data types have certain characteristics in common with the extended data types.
BOOLEAN and LVARCHAR data types
BOOLEAN and LVARCHAR data types behave like built-in data types except that the system catalog tables define them as extended data types.

For more information, see Select data types and to the system catalog tables in the IBM® Informix® Guide to SQL: Reference.

IDSSECURITYLABEL data type
The IDSSECURITYLABEL data type stores a security label in a table that is protected by a security policy. Only a user who holds the DBSECADM role can create, alter, or drop a column of this data type. This is a built-in DISTINCT OF VARCHAR(128) data type, but it is not classified as a character data type because its use is restricted to label-based access control (LBAC).

For more information, see the system catalog tables in the IBM Informix Guide to SQL: Reference and to IBM Informix Security Guide.

BLOB and CLOB data types
The BLOB and CLOB data types are not fundamental data types because you can randomly access data from within the BLOB or CLOB. You can create a table with BLOB and CLOB columns, but you cannot insert data directly into the column. You must use functions to insert and manipulate the data.

For more information, see Smart large objects.

BSON and JSON data types
The BSON and JSON data types are built-in opaque data types that emulate the functionality of field-value pair data types in NoSQL document stores. On tables with BSON or JSON columns, if you define multiple indexes, with each index based on a single field, you can use those indexes to access subsets of the documents in BSON or JSON collections. By calling built-in functions, queries can retrieve rows whose BSON and JSON column values correspond to specific SQL data types.