SharePoint uses the BLOB data type in SQL Server to store files. SharePoint is the primordial ancestor of WinFS. It is tempting to see it as a full replacement for a traditional file system like NTFS. But there are limitations explored in “SharePoint vs. File Shares” here:
http://spsdreamjob.spaces.live.com
/blog/cns!D0B14C6B969D7501!131.entry
-
“Long Paths—WebDav has a limit of 260 chars, and so does MOSS/WSS [or less].”
-
“Weird files with inter-file references—the most common problem here includes Excel spreadsheets that are typically peppered with references to data stored in other excel files…”
-
“Weird file names—Infrequently users will have filenames that are like test...txt or test#%.txt as a requirement of some application, or as part of a file naming standard.”
According to “Is the File Server Dead?” by Joel Oleson, these are valid uses of the File System over SharePoint:
- Product Distribution (Product packages like Office)
- SMS distribution point (desktop patches and hot fixes)
- NT Backups, Backup Servers and Desktop Backups
- Database Storage
- Large Audio/Video and Streaming Media and other large archive read only media such as DVDs, CDs storage (.iso, .wmv, .ram, .vhd)
- Developer Source Control
- Batch, Command Scripts, Executables (.exe, .vbs, .cmd, .bat)
- Application Server... Client Application Storage Linked Files and File Dependencies - (.lnk, .lck)
- Archives and Dumps (.arj, .rar, .zip, .dmp, .bak)
[http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2007/01/02/is-the-file-server-dead.aspx]