Slowing Down?

For those of you with Enterprise Content Management systems, you know that a lot (if not all) of your data is stored in a database.  A lot of times, performance issues are not a result of your Content Management system itself, rather your database is not tuned properly.

Most of what I have to work with is Microsoft SQL Server.  There are a few tips for making sure that your database is performing at its best.  Every system is different, but there are some basic fundamentals that need to be checked.

1. Memory – SQL will eat up all the memory you give it.  Make sure that the host machine has plenty available and tune the SQL memory usage so that it does not use up all available memory on the host and slow the whole system.
2. Network – Your database server needs to have good connectivity to your client machines.  This means that the network has to have adequate speed and a low enough latency for all SQL connections and data streams to be maintained.
3. Indexes – A database uses a basic structure to store information.  Every search it performs has to find a single row, which can be like finding a needle in a haystack.  Fortunately, in addition to rows, SQL also has indexes to aid in searching.  Most systems will use indexes.  However, indexes have a tendency to become fragmented if they are not maintained, so part of your SQL maintenance should be to tune the indexes.

I hope this gets you going in the right direction!  If you feel that your content management system is not performing adequately, let the ImageSource Support Department know!

Mike Peterson, MCTS
Support Engineer
ImageSource, Inc.