Using Media Recovery Statements
Oracle uses these basic media recovery SQL*Plus statements, which differ only in the way the system determines the set of files to be recovered:

RECOVER DATABASE
RECOVER TABLESPACE
RECOVER DATAFILE

Each statement uses the same criteria to determine whether files are recoverable. Oracle prevents two recovery sessions from recovering the same file and prevents media recovery of a file that is in use.

You can also use the SQL statement ALTER DATABASE RECOVER, although Oracle strongly recommends you use the SQL*Plus RECOVER statement instead so that Oracle will prompt you for the names of the archived redo logs.

Basic statements purpose is different little bit. AFA option of recovering until cancel using controlfile its same.