The original Export utility (exp) writes data from an Oracle database into an operating system file in binary format. This file is stored outside the database, and it can be read into another Oracle database using the original Import utility.
Original Export is desupported for general use as of Oracle Database 11g. The only supported use of original Export in Oracle Database 11g is backward migration of XMLType data to Oracle Database 10g release 2 (10.2) or earlier. Therefore, Oracle recommends that you use the new Data Pump Export and Import utilities, except in the following situations which require original Export and Import:
You want to import files that were created using the original Export utility (exp).
You want to export files that will be imported using the original Import utility (imp). An example of this would be if you wanted to export data from Oracle Database 10g and then import it into an earlier database release.
See the following topics: