A feature of using the Remote Blob Storage with SharePoint 2010 (FILESTREAM provider in SQL Server 2008) is that document versions do not always create a new full copy of the original file, as it would in a non-RBS environment.
This is a huge improvement since 5 versions of a 10 MB file where only metadata is changed would result in 50 MB purely for file contents (not counting metadata storage size).
SharePoint 2010 without RBS
The files are stored in the Content Database in [AllDocStreams] in a varbinary field called Content. Each version counts as a record and the Contents field is replicated, even if only a metadata change occurred.
SharePoint 2010 with RBS
The files are stored on the file system. Each file or version record in the Content Database (table [AllDocStreams]) maintains a pointer to the RbsId. As you see in the screen below multiple versions still point to the same identifier of the blob, as long as the actual file hasn’t changed.
Very nice !
In SharePoint Server 2010 you have the option to create an Enterprise Wiki, but what if you have SharePoint Foundation 2010 or Search Server 2010 and you want to create a Wiki site ? You’ll notice that there’s no Wiki Site Template available like in SharePoint 2007 but nowadays you can activate Wiki-functionality on any site template.
You can activate the Wiki-functionality in the Site Features, look for the “Wiki Page Home Page” Feature.
It will
- Create the Site Pages library
- Create a new home page and set it as the Welcome Page for the site
- The original home page (“default.aspx”) will remain available in the background. You can still navigate to it directly.
Any modifications to the original home page (like Web Parts) need to be reapplied to the new home page. And keep in mind that it doesn’t play so nicely with some multi-paged site templates like the Meeting Workspaces template.
