Resource consumption on server viewing huge files?

[Rene Wegener]

Hi guys,

there's something I've been thinking about recently and would love to hear your oppinion. In a project we're gonna upload some huge files to Confluence, e.g. large word docs or Excel files of some MB including Macros and stuff.

I'm now wondering about how much this might affect the server and what's the best way to work with these files. More specific:

1) If people tend to view files in their browser, does this affect the server or is the whole rendering stuff done on the browser side?

2) If uploading these files causes a lot of resource consumption e.g. for indexing, would it make more sense to store large files on some cloud storage and just reference them (knowing they won't be available in search then)?

Thanks for your suggestions and best regards, René

[AnnWorley]

For 1:

The rendering is done partly on the browser and partly on the server. The server and the browser will cache the file after first view so subsequent views are less resource intensive.

You can avoid rendering on the server by disabling the view file macro so that users have to download the attachment to view it.

For 2:

The upload process itself can use a lot of server memory, but you should be able to do it without impacting the users if your Java heap settings are reasonable.

You can turn off indexing of attachments if you become concerned about the indexing taking too many resources.

The Cloud storage idea is a sound strategy. If you ever change the storage location you will have to update a lot of links, however.

I look forward to hearing what other Community members have experienced with large attachments in their environments.

[Rene Wegener]

Thank you very much Ann,

great answer with in-depth explanation!

Regards, René