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The FILESTREAM Data Type in SQL Server 2008

Aneef Fashir — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 09:39:32 +0000

Seriously, i’ve no time these days for blogging, busy with work as well as personal activities. but just wanted to share this valuable information for those who might have missed.

Well the current project which im working on is the ASSETTE Presentations. for more information on the project you can see the above link. but the project uses alot of binary data transfered back and forth to the server and the client thorugh our web services, and most of these binary files are stored in SQL Server 2005 Database. storing binary files inside the database really slows down retrieval of the files when we need them and there are several other desadvantages also. specially rapidly growing size of the database,taking backups, and maintainance of the database.

But now with SQL Server 2008 we have a new data type called FILESTREAM , to solve all the above issues.

What is FILESTREAM?

FILESTREAM is a new datatype in SQL SERVER 2008. To use FILESTREAM, a database needs to contain a FILESTREAM filegroup and a table which contains a varbinary(max) column with the FILESTREAM attribute set. This causes the Database Engine to store all data for that column in the file system, but not in the database file. A FILESTREAM filegroup is a special folder that contains file system directories known as data containers. These data containers are the interface between Database Engine storage and file system storage through which files in these data containers are maintained by Database Engine.

What FILESTREAM does?

By creating a FILESTREAM filegroup and setting a FILESTREAM attribute on the column of a table, a data container is created which will take care of DML statements.

FILESTREAM will use Windows API for streaming the files so that files can be accessed faster. Also instead of using SQL SERVER cache it will use Windows cache for caching the files accessed.

When you use FILESTREAM storage, consider the following:

When a table contains a FILESTREAM column, each row must have a unique row ID.
FILESTREAM data containers cannot be nested.
When you are using failover clustering, the FILESTREAM filegroups must be on shared disk resources.
FILESTREAM filegroups can be on compressed volumes.

For more information on how to use FILESTREAM and to have a in depth knowladge about it please refer the below article in SQLSERVERCENTRA L. its well written and gives you a clear idea on what it is.

The FILESTREAM Data Type in SQL Server 2008

By Deepa Gheewala, 2008/09/24

and here is another blog post on the same topic in MSDN Blogs.

Hope It helps!.

FREE - Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition & Expression Studio For Students

Aneef Fashir — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 06:11:25 +0000

Well Last February Microsoft Announced Dreamspark. which provides free downloads of professional developer tools for students. but it seems a lot of students doesnt know about it. so i thought i could inform you all, in case if you had missed it.

DreamSpark is simple, it’s all about giving students Microsoft professional-level developer and design tools at no charge so you can chase your dreams and create the next big breakthrough in technology - or just get a head start on your career.

Here are some of the products it gives for free

For more info visit Dreamspark Home here.

MSDN Reader!! A Must Have Application!

Aneef Fashir — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 10:03:12 +0000

www.windowsclient.net have released a new "Syndicated Client Starter Kit" designed to make it easy to create rich, syndicated multimedia and content experiences which engage the user, from documents and photos to videos and podcasts.you can read the story here.

And this Starter Kit Show case includes an awsum MSDN Reader. The MSDN Reader allows you to browse through MSDN Magazine articles like never before. Read through articles, view figures and code snippets in an intuitive and easy-to-use experience. The complete source code for the reader is also provided for us to download here.

Its totally free. and I would say its a must have for we developers. so what are you waiting for install it!

Download it here
Source Code
Syndication Starter Kit home

VS 2008 Web Deployment Project Support Released

Aneef Fashir — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 06:21:17 +0000

Last Friday Microsoft released the final RTW (release to web) support for VS 2008 Web Deployment projects. Scott Guthrie has written more on this on his blog. read it here.

Microsoft to Release IE 8 Beta 1 in First Half of 2008

Aneef Fashir — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 09:30:57 +0000

Microsoft says,the first beta of the next version of the Internet Explorer browser will be released in the first half of 2008,

to read more about this visit here

Visual Studio 2008 (ORCAS) is here!

Aneef Fashir — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 12:23:58 +0000

Scott Guthrie Announced in his blog entry , that Microsoft shipped Visual Studio 2008 and .NET 3.5 final version last week.

If you are a MSDN subscriber, you can download your copy from the MSDN subscription site (note: some of the builds are just finishing being uploaded now - so check back later during the day if you don’t see it yet).

If you are a non-MSDN subscriber, you can download a 90-day free trial edition of Visual Studio 2008 Team Suite here. A 90-day trial edition of Visual Studio 2008 Professional (which will be a slightly smaller download) will be available next week. A 90-day free trial edition of Team Foundation Server can also be downloaded here.

If you want to use the free Visual Studio 2008 Express editions (which are much smaller and totally free), you can download them here.

If you want to just install the .NET Framework 3.5 runtime, you can download it here.

visit Scotts Blog for a quick capture of the features of visual studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5.

ScottGu’s Blog