Character data types

If a database is not ANSI-compliant, you get no error if a character field (CHAR, CHARACTER, LVARCHAR, NCHAR, NVARCHAR, VARCHAR, CHARACTER VARYING) receives a string that is longer than the specified length of the field. The database server truncates the extra characters without resulting in an error message. Thus the semantic integrity of data for a CHAR(n) column or variable is not enforced when the value inserted or updated exceeds n bytes.

In an ANSI-compliant database, you get an error if any character field (CHAR, CHARACTER, LVARCHAR, NCHAR, NVARCHAR, VARCHAR, CHARACTER VARYING) receives a string that is longer than the specified width of the field.