Technical Notes, Zetadocs

INFO: SharePoint Archive File Planning Advice for Zetadocs for NAV

ZTN4167

ID: ZTN4167

This Zetadocs technical note applies to:

  • Version 5.0 and later of Zetadocs for Microsoft Dynamics NAV

Summary

This technote is intended for Administrators and VARs who are responsible for setting up archiving to SharePoint using Zetadocs for NAV. Zetadocs archives to SharePoint document libraries and when a document library has a large number of items it can reduce the performance of queries running on the SharePoint server. To counteract this you must carefully plan the document libraries organization and how users need to access the data so as to optimize performance.

By setting your Zetadocs Archive file plan to match your expected document archive volume, you can ensure the efficient operation of the software without adversely affecting the performance of the rest of your SharePoint site.

More information

Zetadocs has been designed to optimize performance when working with large SharePoint document libraries; however, it is important that it is configured correctly to take advantage of this. The goal is to archive to document library subfolders and to avoid those subfolders becoming too full (> 1000 documents).

Step 1: Calculate the expected volume of documents that will be archived to this document library.

Note that you may need to consider extremes scenarios so that you can select an appropriate file plan. Scenarios such as:

  • On the last day of the month there is batch processing of NAV records which will result in an exceptional number of documents being emailed and archived compared with other days.

  • Our biggest Customers can have up to 1000 orders processed and archived from document queues per day.
  • There will only be archiving of documents dragged and dropped onto records in the Sales Order Process.

Step 2: Open the Zetadocs General Settings form in NAV (9041209) and set the archive subfoldering to the appropriate file plan for you company.

Remember that you want to aim to have the subfolders with less than 1000 documents. For example:

    If you can have some companies that could have more than 1000 quotes, orders and invoices processed and archived per day combined, then you may want to consider subfolder settings:
    • DATE(YYYY-MM-DD) \ COMPANY \ DOCTYPE
    • Or using the Zetadocs for NAV SDK’s to implement custom subfolder options specific to your business needs.
  • If you batch process Sales Invoices on particular days and this can be up to 3000 documents then subfolder settings:
    •  COMPANY \ DATE(YYYY-MM-DD)

Step 3: Train your staff on best practices when using document libraries in SharePoint.

  • Avoid using the Zetadocs for NAV archive for storing other documents that are unrelated to the processes and workflows of Zetadocs and NAV. If users are uploading documents through the SharePoint UI without consideration for your file plan then this can seriously affect the performance of your SharePoint server and Zetadocs for NAV. Instead create separate document libraries for those requirements.
  • DO NOT archive directly to the root folder of document library’s. Over filling the root folder of your document libraries can prevent any queries running on that document library.
  • Avoid depending on browsing of your document library using the subfolder names to find documents. SharePoint best practices encourage the use of filtered views based on metadata for navigating your document libraries. For more information on filtered views see the references at the end of this document.

Maintenance

Over time your Zetadocs for NAV archive document library will get larger and larger. SharePoint document libraries can hold up to 30,000,000 documents. It is worth considering creating a new document library every few of years depending on the volume of documents you expect to have.

Note that a hotfix was made available (11.1.2547) to improve performance for large document libraries and to resolve issues around SharePoint throttling (ZTN4579).

References

Online Course for Microsoft SharePoint Server Large List Management

Creating Document Library Views for Browsing Your Documents

Organizing Files in a Library

FIX: Zetadocs Factbox displays a "Failed to search for documents" error

Last updated: 26th October 2022  (BM/MW/CR)