Some products (such as Database Manager and some programming languages) support the DBCS data type (or the graphic data type) in addition to the character data type. The DBCS data type accepts only DBCS strings while the character data type accepts SBCS/DBCS mixed strings (including SBCS strings and DBCS strings by definition of SBCS/DBCS mixed string).
Note: In a PC environment, the DBCS data type is merely a subclass (special case) of the character data type since SO/SI are not used. In a host environment, however, the above is not true. The DBCS data type contains DBCS characters without SO/SI while, in the character data type, DBCS characters are always bracketed by SO/SI.
There are some differences in handling SBCS/DBCS mixed strings from that of DBCS strings as explained in the following sections.