In questi giorni sto seguendo un bel progetto WSS 3.0 per una grossa organizzazione che ha deciso di passare il proprio archivio documentale da File Server a SharePoint (WSS 3.0).

Considerato che lo storage stimato sarà abbastanza esteso (circa un paio di Tera Bytes, nel primo anno), sto lavorando parecchio nella pianificazione e monitoraggio dello storage.

Il 3 dicembre Microsoft ha pubblicato un interessante whitepaper, estremamente utile per chi è alle prese con queste problematiche.

Riporto solo un paio di passaggi dal documento:

Limit content database size to enhance manageabilityPlan for database sizing that will allow for manageability and performance of your environment.

·          In most circumstances, to enhance the performance of SharePoint Products and Technologies, we discourage the use of content databases larger than 100 GB. If your design requires a database larger than 100 GB, follow the guidance below:

·          Use a single site collection for the data.

·          Use a differential backup solution, such as SQL Server or Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager, rather than the built-in backup and recovery tools.

·          Test the server running SQL Server and the I/O subsystem before moving to a solution that depends on a 100 GB content database.

·          Whenever possible, we strongly advise that you split content from a site collection that is approaching 100 GB into a new site collection in a separate content database to avoid performance or manageability issues.

·          Limit content databases that contain multiple site collections to approximately 100 GB.

Allocate storage for versions and the recycle binIf you plan to use versioning or recycle bins in a site, be aware of the potential impact to the site quota.

·          In libraries that have version control enabled, the storage used for previous versions counts towards the site quota. Be aware of this fact and plan accordingly.

·          For any site, you can enable one or two Recycle Bin stages. The first stage (user and site Recycle Bins) – counts towards the site quota. The second stage (the Site Collection Recycle Bin) does not count toward the site quota; however the content in the second stage is added to the storage used by the site collection. Remember to plan sufficient additional storage space for the second stage Recycle Bin. Pay close attention to the number of days you are retaining deleted documents in each Recycle Bin stage.

Use quota templates to manage storageUse quota templates to manage site collections with similar characteristics. A quota template sets storage limits for site collections, and also provides email alerts when specified storage sizes are reached. Any change made to a quota template will not affect previously created sites, only new ones.Manage your large lists for performanceHow you structure and view large lists can affect performance.

·          SharePoint Products and Technologies support large lists, but you must carefully plan how users view the lists to prevent performance impacts.

·          To improve the rendering performance of views that return a large number of results, index one or more columns in the list. Only one indexed column can be used in a view filter. You can filter on many different columns, but it is important that the first column that you use to filter the view has an index and that it sufficiently reduces the total number of items returned.

·          If you must create and browse large lists, define and use customized filtered views that are configured to return less than 5,000 items.

·          Change the default view of your list to one that obeys these rules.

·          For best performance, do not go over 2,000 items in a list level (for example, the root of the list or a single folder).

·          Also, be careful to evaluate list size in terms of the number of columns in a list. Very wide tables can perform slowly.