With the default installation, attachments are stored as BLOB’s in the database. With simple configuration, it is possible to store some or all the file attachments on the file system of attached storage. The file system must obviously have sufficient storage for the volume of attachments you expect, and you must ensure you have a proper backup procedure in place for this storage. There are three behavior settings that control the storage of attachments, and these should be set after you install ExtraView and ensure it is functioning (see the following section). These settings are found in the Environment Settings section of Administration:
If you have existing attachments in the database and would like to migrate them to the file system, see the section Configure Attachments
| Attachment behavior settings | Default Value | Description |
| ATTACHMENT_REPOSITORY_DMAX | 999 | The maximum number of files or directories that will be created under one node of the external directory structure. The default for this value is 999. It is not likely that this value needs to be altered. |
| ATTACHMENT_REPOSITORY_OPT | INTERNAL | This setting controls whether attachments are stored internally within the database, externally on the file system, or in some combination of the two methods. If the value of this setting is INTERNAL, then all attachments are stored internally within the database. If the value of this setting is EXTERNAL, then all the attachments are stored on the external file system. Alternatively, you may provide a comma separated list of file extensions and then all files with these extensions will be stored externally while all other files will be stored in the database. For example, if you set the value of this setting to "avi, png, gif, jpg" then files of these types will be stored externally. This strategy leaves the files stored internally in the database as searchable by keywords, while the image and video files are stored externally. The default for this value is INTERNAL. Also, ensure that the setting ATTACHMENT_REPOSITORY_ROOT is set correctly before storing attachments outside the database. |
| ATTACHMENT_REPOSITORY_ROOT | The name of the directory on the file system where file attachments will be stored. Before any attachments are stored externally, you must also provide a valid setting for the setting ATTACHMENT_REPOSITORY_OPT. You must also ensure that the path is valid from the application server(s) that are running ExtraView, and that you have all the permissions to read and write to the storage. You must also ensure that you set up a separate backup method for this external storage as backing up your database will no longer backup the file attachments. |
