On: Null Values in SQL Queries

[zadokshi]

This is the perfect example. In an enterprise, some forms might ask middle name and some forms might not.

In the database you need to represent if the user entered a blank name “”, or if the middle name was never even requested NULL.

Only in Oracle is it not possible to make this distinction. Oracle is definitely broken in this regard.

Inserting a string in the middle name column “unknown” or “unspecified” is a clunky workaround.