design a share point 2013 architecture – the basics
DESCRIPTION
session walks you through the necessary steps to design a SharePoint 2013 architecture. It explains what information is needed to actually design such an architecture and discusses the many things you need to know to make the right decisions. It helps you to design a small, medium or large SharePoint farm for your customersTRANSCRIPT
Design a SharePoint 2013 Architecture – The basicsDecember 2013Alexander Meijers
“A SharePoint architecture is a blueprint of a SharePoint platform which incorporates all related aspects which influence the platform in some way.”
So what is an architecture?
Architecture depends on many things Structure of content and data Accessibility of content and data Availability (content, data, services) Scalability Infrastructure (offline / online / hybrid) LOB / External systems Services & processes
So architecture is not only a bunch of servers!!!
Architecture or what?
How to create an
architecture
Content & data What kind of? What is the purpose?
Accessibility Which groups of people can you identify? How is access handled?
Infrastructure Where is everything stored? On-premises, online or Hybrid?
Architecture What is needed? Which services are used? Any external (LOB) systems?
Stakeholders Who is involved during the design? Without them your design will not be accepted!
How to create an architecture?
Infrastructure
Exte
rnal Syst
em
s
Content & Data
Architecture
Accessibility
Groups of people
Sta
keh
old
ers
AnonymousFBA
O Farms T Farm A Farm P1 Farm P2 Farm P3FarmLoad Balancer
Search Service (Shared)
Managed Metadata Service (Shared)
Content deployment
My Sites Intranet Internet
Active Directory
Search ServiceSearch ServiceMetadata Service
Metadata Service
Explain the steps
in creating an
architecture
What kind of SharePoint platform Publishing Portal Intranet environment Collaboration sites Dashboard of data Data storage (e.g. Knowledge Center) Search driven environment Combination of above
Legacy Is it a migration? New platform next to an existing one Expanding an existing platform
Content & data
Availability My Sites less available than intranet Publishing site on internet highly
available
Amount of content Current amount of content Expected growth Backups
Usage of custom components
Is there any custom development? Are they going to use SharePoint Apps?
Content & data External Systems Is data exposed from external (LOB)
systems? Are there forms used which post
data to external systems?
Keep track of your boundaries
Maximum size of content databases Number of web applications and
site collections Number of application pools
Who is accessing which data and from where?
Define groups of people
What kind of data is accessed?
Accessibility
Groups of people Location Data Accessed
Internal employees Intranet Intranet Portal, Company information, internal data, internal project sites, my sites and profiles.
External employees Internet, Remote Session
Same as internal employees
Partners Internet, Remote Session
Project sites, Partner Portal
Visitors Internet A companies website, customer Portal
How is data accessed by these groups of people?
Content is offered through Farms Web applications & Zones Site collections
Content is accessed through NTLM through Active Directory Form Based Authentication Claims-based authentication Third-party authentication method Key or SMS service Combination of above
Accessibility
Get the numbers of users and their activity
Number of users Current users Expected growth
Usage Expected usage of the platform (e.g. number of simultaneous users) Peak moments (bursts of users)
Accessibility
There are many choices when it comes to infrastructure. So what do you choose?
Examples of infrastructure On-premises (hosted by company or external party) SharePoint Online Windows Azure Hybrid
Virtualization VMWare Hyper-V
Number of hosts
Infrastructure
SharePoint Online Hybrid
Azure On Premises
Possible infrastructure solutionsSubscription
Search portal
On premises
Sites
Reverse proxy
SharePoint Server 2013
Search portal
Sites
SharePoint Online
Web servers
All databases
Application servers
Dedicated application servers for search components
Active Directory
On Premises
On premises
SharePoint Online Active Directory
Directory synchronization
Windows Azure Active Directory Tenant
Windows Azure
Subscription
Virtual Network
Cloud Service
AD 1 AD 2
On Premises
WFE 1
WFE 2
WFE 3
App
App
SQL 1
SQL 2
Cloud Service
SharePoint Farm Windows Server Active Directory and DNS
80/443
Windows Azure
VPN Tunnel
Active Directory
Stakeholders
Business Owners
Steering committee
IT Manageme
nt
Risk & Security
Compliance
What do you need to design?
Hosts, Farms, Loadbalancers and proxies
Model (OTAP, TAP, AP or P)
Services and Service Applications
Connectivity with external (LOB) systems
Data Layer
Architecture
Architecture - ServicesWhich services are you going to use?
Foundation, Standard or Enterprise
License costs
Number of databases
Mixed licenses
New!
New!
New!
New!
Share services across farms
Business Connectivity Services, Machine Translation Service, Managed Metadata Service, Search Service (Crawl, Index, Query), Secure Store Service, User Profile Service
Use different application pools for isolation
Service Groups Also called Proxy groups Used to group a set of services and connect
them to a web application
Architecture - Services
http://my/personal/<user>
http://my
Application Pool
HR
http://Fabrikam
Application Pool
Facilities Purchasing
http://communities
Web Application—Published Intranet Content Web Application—My Sites Web Application—Community Sites
Application Pool
IIS Web Site— "͞SharePoint Web Services $͞
Default group
Team 1
http://team
Team 2 Team 3
Web Application—Team Sites
Excel Services
Business Data Connectivity
Managed Metadata
App Management
Machine Translation
Word Automation
Access Services
Visio Graphics
Work Management
Search
Secure Store Service
User Profile
SQL Server 2008 R2 or SQL Server 2012
Standard or Enterprise License costs
New functionality with SQL Server 2012
Use of Report Server and Reporting Services Add-in with SharePoint 2013
New Excel Features (advanced data models, define KPI’s, etc.)
Power View AlwaysOn Availability Groups AlwaysOn Failover Cluster
Architecture – Data Layer
Enterprise
Enterprise
Enterprise
Topologies
Standard topology The standard three-tier topology in which the farm is divided into three layers.
Streamlined topology A topology to optimize system resources and to maximize performance for users. Optimize for Low latency, Load and Throughput
Other options Mobile Architecture Global solutions Hybrid topologies
Topologies
Topologies - Server RolesRole Traditional Topology Streamlined
Topology(each tier optimized)
Streamlined Topology(Optimize for)
Web Server Fast, Light-weight server which responds to user requests from web pages. All web servers are mirrors of each other and load balanced. Directs requests to the appropriate application servers
Service Applications, Services and components that serve user requests directly
Low latency
Access Services, BCS, Metadata, User Profile
Application Server
Runs one or more services in the SharePoint Farm. Load balancing possible by redundant application servers
Service Applications, Services and components that process background tasks. Also called batch processing.
Load
User Profile Synchronization, Workflow, Machine translation, Work management
Search on separate dedicated machines
Database Server
Stores content and service data. Databases can be clustered or mirrored for failover protection
Stores content and service data. Databases can be clustered or mirrored for failover protection
Throughput
Topologies – Farm typesFarm Number of
serversPurpose
Limited Deployment 1-2 Used for product evaluation, development and testing with a limited number of users
Small farm 3-4 Serve a large number of users and scales out based on how heavily services are used. These types of farms are not always fault-tolerant
Medium farm 6+ Serve a large number of users and scales out based on how heavily services are used. Their goal is a multi-purpose environment with possible optimalisation. These farms are always fault-tolerant.
Large farm Mostly a lot Serve a large number of users. Group service applications, services or databases that have similar performance characteristics on dedicated servers
Start designing your
SharePoint 2013
architecture
Use the gathered information on content & data, accessibility and infrastructure
Use the technical diagrams for SharePoint 2013 as a starting point
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263199.aspx They contain different approaches (choose wisely ) Great resource for designing your architecture
Design your architecture
All Web and Service Applications
and database
Limited deployment
• Evaluation, development or for less than 100 users
Limited deployment
All Web and Service Applications
All SharePoint databases
• Up to 10000 users with standard topology• Less than 1000 users with streamlined
topology due to batch processing services
Small Farm
All Web and Service Applications
All Web and Service Applications
All SharePoint databases
Small Farm
Web / QueryWeb / Query
All SharePoint databases
Other Service Application roles
• User performance and higher availability
Small Farm
Web / QueryWeb / Query
All SharePoint databases
Other Service Application roles
• User performance and higher availability• Fault tolerance of service applications
Medium Farm
Web Servers
All SharePoint databases
All Service Application roles
• User performance and higher availability• Fault tolerance of service applications• High availability group databases
Medium / Large Farm
Web Servers
All SharePoint databases
All Service Application roles
• User performance and higher availability
• Fault tolerance of service applications
• Dedicated servers for Query and Index
• Servers divided over two hosts for higher availability
• Cluster Failover databases
Host 1 Host 2
Failover Cluster & Availability Groups
Medium / Large Farm
Web Servers
All SharePoint databases
All Service Application roles
• User performance and higher availability
• Fault tolerance of service applications
• Servers divided over multiple hosts for higher availability
• Cluster Failover databases
Host 1 Host 2
Host 3 Host 4
Host 5 Host 6
Failover Cluster & Availability Groups
Medium / Large Farm
Web Servers
All SharePoint databases
All Other Service Application roles • User performance and higher
availability• Fault tolerance of service
applications• Servers divided over multiple hosts
for higher availability• Search components divided over
servers and hosts• Cluster Failover databases
Host 1 Host 2
Host 3 Host 4
Host 5 Host 6
Failover Cluster & Availability Groups
Index
All Other Service Application roles
Crawl Crawl
Query Query
Crawl DB
O Farms T Farm A Farm P1 Farm P2 Farm
Multiple Farms
Content deployment
O Farms T Farm A Farm P1 Farm P2 Farm
Multiple Farms
Content deployment
O Farms T Farm A Farm P1 Farm P2 Farm
Multiple Farms
P3Farm
Load Balancer
Host 1 Host 2
Content deployment
O Farms T Farm A Farm P1 Farm P2 Farm
Multiple Farms
P3Farm
Load Balancer
Host 1 Host 2
Search Service (Shared)
Managed Metadata Service (Shared)
Content deployment
Search ServiceSearch ServiceMetadata Service
Metadata Service
Web Servers In a multiple server farm each web
server represents 10000 users Using multiple front-end web servers
allows you to divide load
Services Move services which use too much
resources to separate Application Servers Search Service mostly needs a separate
Application Server Run services on multiple Application
Servers for redundancy Let the Search crawler crawl the
application server in stead of the web server
Architecture – Some takeaways Databases A small Farm environment can host
all databases on a single server Group databases based on their role
on multiple servers for larger environments
Servers Less virtual servers are needed
when using Windows Server 2012 in stead of Windows Server 2008 R2 due to the fact that a larger of resources can be allocated for the virtual machine
the complete picture
AnonymousFBA
O Farms T Farm A Farm P1 Farm P2 Farm P3FarmLoad Balancer
Search Service (Shared)
Managed Metadata Service (Shared)
Content deployment
My Sites Intranet Internet
Active Directory
Search ServiceSearch ServiceMetadata Service
Metadata Service
Architecture is based on: the decision made for Hosts, Farms, Web Applications and Site collections chosen infrastructure services needed service applications legacy systems content deployment dependencies with external systems …
Architecture is based on everything!!!
Architecture
Other important
things that
concern architectu
re
Continuous optimalisation and monitoring
Governance Governance handbook Guidelines Support
Define roles for administrating the environment(s)
Server Management SharePoint Administrator Database Administrator
Optimalisation
Always execute at the lowest possible level in your infrastructure
Use a combination of SQL backups and SharePoint Farm backups
Don’t use Hyper-V / VMWare snapshots
Recovery Test Design a backup & recovery strategy plan Execute the plan
Backup & Recovery
Questions?