Before using StarTeam Server, you must decide what database to use and where to store the database and file revisions. Then you must create at least one StarTeam Server configuration (an instance of the StarTeam Server). This topic discusses StarTeam Server configurations and their storage hives.
A StarTeam Server configuration defines:
Any number of projects can be stored in the database associated with a particular server configuration. However, the database must be configured properly to store the amount of data produced by those projects. For more information about specific databases supported by StarTeam Server, refer to the StarTeam Release Notes.
You can create a server configuration by using the Server Administration tool. A server configuration defines a specific database as the repository for its data. To prevent corruption, that database can be associated with only one server configuration. However, that database can be used by other applications. The application stores all projects on the Server, which may contain numerous server configurations.
To access an existing project, you must first add its server configuration to your system. The StarTeam Server can be accessed from any of its clients. Each client must have a user name and the correct access rights to access the selected server configuration. Your company or team may store its data on several server configurations on one or more computers. Any of these configurations can be accessed from a number of clients.
More than one instance of the StarTeam Server may be running on the same computer. For example, you might run one server configuration with a sample project and another with a software development project, both on the same computer. Each server configuration has a different name and a different port or endpoint for each protocol. When a configuration is in use, another session using that configuration cannot be started.
Before creating a server configuration, you need to decide upon a unique name for the configuration. This name is case insensitive and cannot contain : \ /, but can contain blanks or apostrophes ( ' ).
The StarTeam Server places server log files in the location designated as the server configuration's repository path. When you first start a new server configuration, the StarTeam Server creates the Attachments folder, HiveIndex, and other folders in the same location. These folders are maintained by the StarTeam Server. Do not delete them.
Other server configuration settings control where, when, how, and by whom the data is accessed. Some initial settings that you provide for the server configuration are properties that are necessary to start it. For example, if the user name and password that allow StarTeam Server to access the database are not accurate, StarTeam Server cannot run. Before starting StarTeam Server, you can change these properties to meet your requirements.
Native-II is a vault architecture that provides greater scalability for all server configurations created with StarTeam and for server configurations converted to Native-II vault format with StarTeam. Server configurations have one or more hives. A hive is a logical disk container of files that includes an Archive area and a Cache area. The archive area consists of a folder tree in which unique file revisions are stored. The cache area consists of a folder tree that stores uncompressed file revisions on a temporary basis. Hives can hold an unlimited number of files, providing increased storage capacity, larger file revisions, more locations to store archives, and faster, more efficient performance. A single server configuration can have several hives, each of which has its own archive and cache path.
The initial hive used for storage of the server configuration’s archive files is created along with the server configuration. You must supply an archive path and a cache path to this hive when creating the server configuration. The default paths are repository_path\DefaultHive\Archives and repository_path\DefaultHive\Cache. If desired, the location of these paths can be changed later by using the Hive Manager dialog found in the Server Administration tool.
Native-II vaults store each file revision in its entirety (even though the archive file may be compressed). But the revisions can be spread over many volumes by the use of hives for storage. If one hive fills up, you can add another, without changing any data locations or moving any archive files. When a server configuration has multiple hives, StarTeam adds files to each hive in turn before reusing the first hive's archive path.
When you create a server configuration, it automatically has at least one hive (either the default or a custom hive). To increase the amount of available space for a server configuration, you can add one or more new hives with the Hive Manager. You can create hives while the server configuration is running, because the configuration already has an initial path, if only to a Default Hive in the repository path. The main purpose of the Hive Manager is to create new hives for an existing StarTeam configuration, to increase the amount of available space.