I am writing an asp.net web application that stores APPLICANTS data in a SQL Server database.
Applicant might post name, address, telephone and a file.
The file might be of any extension including .docx for resume, 'jpg, .pdf for photos.
or even an Excel file.
Is it possible to store all these file extension on my database?
Or will that be lengthy?
Please help
Good question! Personally I would use FILESTREAM in your case and here's why
In SQL Server, BLOBs can be standard varbinary(max) data that stores
the data in tables, or FILESTREAM varbinary(max) objects that store
the data in the file system. The size and use of the data determines
whether you should use database storage or file system storage. If the
following conditions are true, you should consider using FILESTREAM:
Objects that are being stored are, on average, larger than 1 MB.
Fast read access is important.
You are developing applications that use a middle tier for application logic.
For smaller objects, storing varbinary(max) BLOBs
in the database often provides better streaming performance.
You can read up on FILESTREAM here.
Also consider using it in conjunction with FILETABLE.
Finally, here's a .net C# example on how to read from FILESTREAM column.
Please note, FILESTREAM is available in SQL Server starting from 2008 version.
Hope it helps!
Related
Can anyone advise in detail what does the varbinary(max) value represent if say a BLOB file (.pdf) is stored in the file system through the filestream attribute in sql server?
And how does it get copied across databases on different servers by using the usual T-SQL queries?
Many thanks.
Best regards,
Storing BLOB data using a FILESTREAM setup enables you to store your documents on disk while keeping your document's reference information in the database. Sometimes it is advised to use this approach if your file storage solution is cheap while your database storage is not, but it really depends on your requirements.
If you are working with small BLOB files, it might be better to leave the FILESTREAM setup alone as it comes with some overhead configuring and maintaining this. For instance in your comment's example to copy over data from one server to another.
I have SQL Server 2012 and started looking into Filestream as a way to link "attachments" (> 1 GB) such as Excel documents and PDF files to database table records. While I have been successful in finding the "hello world" T-SQL examples that allow me to do some rudimentary tasks (enable Filestream, create table with Filestream column, insert row, etc.) I also encounter "beware" statements.
Is Filestream really as temperamental and full of "gotchas" as I the variously placed forum writings suggest, or is it straight forward and with a least predictable quriks?
Thank you for any insight
I would recommend using filetable which is implemented using filestream and its really neat enhancement, it preserves functionality of filestream but in contrast to filestream it can be configured to also allow accessing files outside db engine. For example, you can allow IIS to use those files directly. In production in big telecom company from 2013, flawless!
P.S. this is maybe more suitable for comment but I don't have reputation to write it :)
In this case it will be potentially large PDF files. I will be using Entity Framework to insert and retrieve the files. Before anyone mentions it, I am aware that many believe that I should only save the path to the file in the database. I am not interested in doing it that way in this instance. :-)
Although SQL Azure supports these datatypes: binary, varbinary, image,
Blob storage might be a better (and cheaper) option:
Storing binary data (images, files, etc) using WPF + Windows Azure
I have a standard WinForms application that connects to a SQL Server. The application allows users to upload documents which are currently stored in the database, in a table using an image column.
I need to change this approach so the documents are stored as files and a link to the file is stored in the database table.
Using the current approach - when the user uploads a document they are shielded from how this is stored, as they have a connection to the database they do not need to know anything about where the files are stored, no special directory permissions etc are required. If I set up a network share for the documents I want to avoid any IT issues such as the users having to have access to this directory to upload to or access existing documents.
What are the options available to do this? I thought of having a temporary database where the documents are uploaded to in the same way as the current approach and then a process running on the server to save these to the file store. This database could then be deleted and recreated to reclaim any space. Are there any better approaches?
ADDITIONAL INFO: There is no web server element to my application so I do not think a WCF service is possible
Is there a reason why you want to get the files out of the database in the first place?
How about still saving them in SQL Server, but using a FILESTREAM column instead of IMAGE?
Quote from the link:
FILESTREAM enables SQL Server-based applications to store unstructured
data, such as documents and images, on the file system. Applications
can leverage the rich streaming APIs and performance of the file
system and at the same time maintain transactional consistency between
the unstructured data and corresponding structured data.
FILESTREAM integrates the SQL Server Database Engine with an NTFS file
system by storing varbinary(max) binary large object (BLOB) data as
files on the file system. Transact-SQL statements can insert, update,
query, search, and back up FILESTREAM data. Win32 file system
interfaces provide streaming access to the data.
FILESTREAM uses the NT system cache for caching file data. This helps
reduce any effect that FILESTREAM data might have on Database Engine
performance. The SQL Server buffer pool is not used; therefore, this
memory is available for query processing.
So you would get the best out of both worlds:
The files would be stored as files on the hard disk (probabl faster compared to storing them in the database), but you don't have to care about file shares, permissions etc.
Note that you need at least SQL Server 2008 to use FILESTREAM.
I can tell you how I implemented this task. I wrote a WCF service which is used to send archived files. So, if I were you, I would create such a service which should be able to save files and send them back. This is easy and you also must be sure that the user under which context the WCF service works has permission to read write files.
You could just have your application pass the object to a procedure (CLR maybe) in the database which then writes the data out to the location of your choosing without storing the file contents. That way you still have a layer of abstraction between the file store and the application but you don't need to have a process which cleans up after you.
Alternatively a WCF/web service could be created which the application connects to. A web method could be used to accept the file contents and write them to the correct place, it could return the path to the file or some file identifier.
I am using T-SQL and Microsoft Management Studio 2008 R2. I want to create a database in which I can store video files.
After google search and some reading I have learned that there is a option to use "File Stream Enable Database". It was said that this kind of database should be used only when your files are larger then 2MB. I want to store video files, so I think this is suitable for my goals.
Please, give me more information about the main difference in using BLOB and FileStream Enable database or just to store the files in a given directory and to save only the url in the database table column?
Thanks in advance.
Filestream was an interesting change when it came in for me; the bit that suprised me was Full Text Search was taken out of the operating system because it caused issues; but file stream put it back because Blobs caused issues.
Using Filestream is basically transparent to your application and it even backs the files up as if they were in the database - and thats the big benefit or cost over the save in database v save pointer in database.
You can insert files the same way as you did before and you can read them back in SQL in exactly the same way. The difference and benefit is that that SQL can take advantage of Windows system cache for reading and files saving its own resources to make other queries run quicker.
Please, give me more information about the main difference in using BLOB and FileStream Enable
database
The feature you call for is "FileStream" not "FileStream enable".
Some blogs are also around, like http://blogs.msdn.com/b/rdoherty/archive/2007/10/12/getting-traction-with-sql-server-2008-filestream.aspx
At kleast try reading the documentation before running around and have other people do your basic groundwork.