title: Create external tables without the EXTERNAL keyword?
body: <p>I am using hive for work. When I created some external tables today, I forgot to type the <code>EXTERNAL</code> keyword, and the HiveQL is like:</p>
  
  <pre><code>CREATE TABLE year_2012_main (
      some BIGINT,
      fields BIGINT,
      should BIGINT,
      beee BIGINT,
      here STRING,
      buttt STRING,
      Iveee STRING,
      decide STRING,
      tohide STRING,
      them BIGINT)
      ROW FORMAT DELIMITED
      FIELDS TERMINATED BY ','
      COLLECTION ITEMS TERMINATED BY ' '
      MAP KEYS TERMINATED BY ':'
      STORED AS TEXTFILE location '/data/content/year_2012_main';
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Then I tried <code>select count (*) from year_2012_main;</code> , and it worked well.</p>
  
  <p>So, just out of curious, what's the difference with or without <code>EXTERNAL</code>?</p>