> Is there any benefit to say using setDate as opposed to setString,
> or setLong instead of setString.
>
> Simply is there any benefit to passing the exact data format stored
> in a column?
>
> For some I specify, but for the most part I just use strings, and
> have not run into any problem so far. At least none that I am aware
> of.

a) you save some CPU cycles of your client for conversion and garbage
collection (conversion is performed on the client before sending data
to the server).

b) you might run into troubles when we will not be able to parse your
string.

Best regards,
Roman Rokytskyy