Change your File Service database to MS SQL

Tricentis File Service is a web-based application that stores your Tosca files in a separate file system, which keeps your testers' workspaces slim and improves workspace performance.

By default, Tricentis File Service creates an SQLite database to store metadata. If you have a large number of testers who all work in the same time zone, this may create concurrency issues with this type of database. To get better performance and more stability, we recommend that you use a self-hosted MS SQL database instead.

This topic explains how to switch from the default SQLite database to an MS SQL database.

Before you start

Before you can make the switch, there are a few preparatory steps you need to take:

  • Reach out to a database administrator, if you aren't one. The database administrator is responsible for setting up the database and for moving the data from one database into the other.

  • Set up the MS SQL database. The MS SQL database isn't part of the Tricentis Tosca or Tosca Server installation. You need to prepare and host it on your end. Don't worry about creating tables. Tosca creates all necessary tables once you start/restart the File Service after the switch.

  • Get a connection string to the MS SQL database. The user in the string must be db_owner and have CREATE, ALTER, SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE rights.

By the way, if you use Tricentis Notification Service and you already have an MS SQL database, you can use the same MS SQL Server instance. However, you need to have separate databases for Tricentis Notification Service and Tricentis File Service in your MS SQL Server instance.

Make the switch

To change the Tricentis File Service database from SQLite to MS SQL, follow these steps: 

  1. If it's already running, stop Tricentis File Service in the Windows Services app.

  2. Open the Tricentis Service Configuration and go to the File Service tab.

  3. In Database Connection, enter the connection string to your MS SQL database and select MSSQL from the dropdown list.

  4. Start/restart Tricentis.File Service. Tosca now creates all necessary tables in the MS SQL database.

  5. Ask your database administrator to export the data from the SQLite database, either as a CSV or SQL file. Then import the data into the MS SQL database.

What's next

Since you're fine-tuning your Tricentis File Service setup, you might also take a look at its auto-removal functionality. Auto-removal helps you to manage the File Service database size without any manual intervention.