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StorageEdge Features

BLOB Exrternalizer

It externalizes the BLOBs from database to external storage. If storage is web application specific, EBS provider is used and if it content database specific, then RBS provider. Externalizer can have multi tiers to store BLOBs and each tier in externalizer must have a Storage Pool associated with it.

Storage Pools (NEW)

Each tier in an Externalizer and Archiver profile is associated with a storage pool which can have one or more storage devices. More devices can added to a storage pool at any time.

Advance BLOB Filters (NEW)

Following new filtering policies are added:

  • File Size, Name or Extension & Author
  • Creation Date Filters
  • Modification Date Filters
  • List Based Filters
Usage Based Retention Policy (NEW)

Along with aging based retention policy, there is a new usage based version policy which can be used to move documents to any other tier if the number of times document is accessed between two consecutive BLOB Transfer jobs is greater or less than certain number.

Tiered Storage

StorageEdge can externalize BLOBs in multiple tiers:

  • Blob Transfer: Blobs will be transferred to next tier on the bases of 'Version' or 'Age'.
  • Archiving: Define policies for a tier like 'Versioning' or 'Aging'.
  • File Author
    • Multiple Storage Providers for SAN, NAS and Cloud

    StorageEdge provides multiple storage providers for externalizing the BLOB contents. File system provider is the default provider for SAN and NAS storage.

    Add Ons (on demand):

    • Amazon
    • Azure
    • EMC Centera
Versioning Retention Policy for Externalizer (NEW)

Users can now control which versions of the documents should be kept on which tier.

Delay Deletion of BLOBs (NEW)

Externalized BLOBs can be configured to remain on external store at least n numbers of days after the corresponding documents are deleted from SharePoint.

Re-evaluate Filters Job (NEW)

If filtering policies of externalizer profiles are changed after offloading BLOBs, users can opt to run this job to make sure that these BLOBs meet the filtering criteria of their tiers.

Custom Storage Providers (NEW)

Users can now write their own storage providers and plug them to offload the BLOBs to these providers.

Support for Distributed File System (NEW)

Since DFS shares can be addressed the same as any other file shares, with StorageEdge users need only to point their BLOB store location at the DFS share where they want their SharePoint BLOBs to be located.

Database Mirroring (NEW)

If SharePoint content database is mirrored, StorageEge automatically starts using the failover database server if primary server is down or inaccessible. Similarly, StorageEdge BLOB store database can also be configured for SQL mirroring.

Consistency Check Job (NEW)

Consistency check job makes sure that the BLOB references on content database, StorageEdge configuration database and external store are consistent with each other. This inconsistency can be produced as a result of restoring SharePoint site and databases from backups.

Asynchronous BLOB Writing (NEW)

To reduce the latency while writing BLOBs to cloud storages, users can opt to asynchronously upload files. This will write BLOBs to staging devices from where they will be uploaded asynchronously to the cloud storages.

BLOB Details of All Versions of a Document (NEW)

BLOB details page now shows the details of all versions of a document.

Migrate/Revert Individual Documents (NEW)

Administrators can migrate or revert individual documents from BLOB details page.

Organized Externalized BLOBs in Folder Structure

StorageEdge provides the following types of structures for saving BLOBs:

  • Flat Hierarchy
  • Auto create folders based on different datetime formats
  • Use SharePoint Folder Names
  • Use SharePoint File Names (by adding the actual file name with its GUID)
Low Disk Notification

With this feature of StorageEdge3.0, you can receive notifications for low disk otherwise the BLOBs will not be externalized when available space becomes zero.

EBS to RBS Conversion

StorageEdge provides you the facility to convert External BLOB Storage to Remote BLOB Storage without copying BLOBs which results in efficient memory consumption.

File Shredding

File System adapter now supports file shredding.

Retention Archiving for Compliance (NEW)

For compliance, StorageEdge can now store copies of BLOBs and their metadata outside the database. Users can specify the retention policies as to how long to keep the archived BLOBs and when to delete.

File Share Linker (NEW)

With this feature, users can manage their legacy file shares through SharePoint document libraries. Linker links all documents in file shares with SharePoint in such a way that documents remain on the file system and only their references are added to SharePoint content database.

Bandwidth Throttling for all types of Jobs

StorageEdge now offers you to configure Job Throttling for various jobs like:

  • Migration jobs throttling
  • Revert jobs throttling
  • Garbage Clean job throttling (only for EBS, because we are not providing the 'Clean' job for RBS)
  • Blob Transfer job throttling
  • EBS to RBS conversion throttling
Jobs Monitoring

This feature provides you the facility to monitor the SharePoint Timer Jobs that are scheduled for any process.

Upgrade SharePoint 2007 to 2010 without 'Reverting' the BLOBs back to SharePoint DB

StorageEdge provides you the facility to upgrade Microsoft SharePoint Server 2007 to Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010, using various approaches. Up gradation is made easy and it's a time saver too.

Content Optimization

Content Optimization feature allows us to reduce the payload that gets transferred over the wire in form of ASP.NET ViewState, Javascript and CSS.

Following are the features of Content Optimization.

  • Cache ASP.NET ViewState on the server preventing it to travel back and forth between client and server allowing optimal use of bandwidth and faster download of the page.
  • Combine and minify multiple Javascript and CSS files into a single css file and cache it for reducing the number of requests the browser makes on per page visit.
    This reduces page rendering time and reduced server traffic.
    Minification removes redundant white space from JavaScript and CSS and obfuscated JS code to reduce the file size and allow faster download of the files
  • Integrated UI in Central Administration for easy management.
  • Performance Counters for monitoring
Session Caching

Cache ASP.NET session and reduce the load on SQL Server (Which is used by default for sessions in SharePoint).

  • Integrated UI in Central Administration for easy management.
List Caching

This feature allows you to save the output of different lists displayed in Calander View, Gantt View, Data Sheet View or HtmlView and prevent database query that retrieves the data of list from Sql Server.

  • We can select different type of expiration for different lists.
  • Integrated UI in Central Administration for easy management.
  • Performance Counters for monitoring.
StorageEdge Monitoring Tool

StorageEdge Monitoring Tool allows you to monitor the performance counters published by NCache and StorageEdge for the entire farm. It also allows you to view SharePoint logs of all the WFEs of the farm on a single farm node.

It greatly simplifies monitoring of your Cache, BLOBs, List and Jobs activity.

Additional Tools
  • BLOBInfo:
    This tool allows you to find actual document name with a BLOB GUID you will provide.
  • BLOBStressTool:
    With this tool you can test BLOB caching under heavy load.
  • NCache Monitoring Tool:
    It is a powerful graphical tool designed to simplify monitoring StorageEdge performance. It allows you monitor BLOB, List and ViewState Caching in real time and see how StorageEdge is improving SharePoint performance.
  • Archives Explorer:
    Explore, download and restore archived documents.