Why to use Blob at all if I can save file pathes in database and actual files in storage?

Question

I know that blob is a data type for binary data as integer is a datatype for int. As they say, It's used to store files directly in database (we move our audio file into blob, and save that blob in database).

Question 1) why to store blob for audio if I can just put the audio in storage for example path /var/www/audio.mp3 and in database I store path_name /var/www/audio.mp3?

Question 2) which is better ? how netflix stores movies? just blobs or what?

Question 3) Curious if there're any cons or prons if you could just give me ideas so that I know when to use them .

Answer 1

Better to use external storage/cdn for serving such kind of large content.

How Netflix and our works? They upload content on external bucket i. e. S3 and write file name in db for identification. According to user file access frequency that file cache on CDN/edge location. User will get awesome experience while content server from their nearest edge location

Answer 2

Putting the blob in the database, rather than a file, allows you to grow to multiple servers with load balancing. If you put the data in files, you would have to replicate the files between the server. Most databases have built-in replication features, this isn't as easy for regular files.

Answer 3

With blob you can store all kinds of stuff. Do you communicate with an API via SOAP or JSON and want to store it in the database? Use a blob. Want to log what a user filled into a form when it threw an exception? Store the entire post as a blob. You can save everything as is. It's handy for logging if you have different data formats. I know an API which expects some data via SOAP and some as JSON. To log the communication I use blob because the response may be in XML, JSON, a number (http code 203 for empty but accepted) or an exception as array.