>Hi Mark,
>
>So I'll at least be able to use some string functions. This is good!
>
>Can I cheat and use NVL(TO_CHAR(SomeClobFld), ???)

Wow! That actually works!

>I assume I can just convert the fields in the database without any fears?

Oracle generates an "inconsistent data types" when you try to replace a CLOB with the contents of a LONG, even if you TO_CHAR the LONG column.

One other good point about CLOB is you can have more than 1 of these data types per table. You can only have 1 LONG per table.