Create Content Database

It's pretty easy to create a content database via the browser and you can create a new content database easily enough when creating a new site collection via stsadm, createsiteinnewdb, or directly using addcontentdb. But what if you need to script the creation of a new content database without creating a site collection and you need to set some of the properties found via the browser that addcontentdb doesn't provide? To do this I created a new command which basically does the same as addcontentdb but adds the additional properties found within central admin: gl-createcontentdb. To accomplish this I first do some checks to make sure that you're not trying to create a database using a name that already exists. I then use the SPWebApplication's ContentDatabases property to add the new database using the parameters provided. Once the database has been created we can set the search service settings:

   1: public override int Run(string command, StringDictionary keyValues, out string output)

   2: {

   3:  output = string.Empty;

   4:  

   5:  InitParameters(keyValues);

   6:  

   7:  string dbserver = Params["dbserver"].Value;

   8:  string dbname = Params["dbname"].Value;

   9:  

  10:  if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(dbserver))

  11:  {

  12:   dbserver = SPWebService.ContentService.DefaultDatabaseInstance.NormalizedDataSource;

  13:  }

  14:  

  15:  using (SPSite site = new SPSite(Params["webapp"].Value))

  16:  {

  17:   SPContentDatabase db = null;

  18:   foreach (SPContentDatabase tempDB in site.WebApplication.ContentDatabases)

  19:   {

  20:    if (tempDB.Name.ToLower() == dbname.ToLower())

  21:    {

  22:     db = tempDB;

  23:     break;

  24:    }

  25:   }

  26:   if (db != null)

  27:    throw new Exception("Content database already exists.");

  28:  

  29:   SPObjectStatus status = (SPObjectStatus)Enum.Parse(typeof(SPObjectStatus), Params["status"].Value, true);

  30:  

  31:   db = site.WebApplication.ContentDatabases.Add(dbserver, dbname, null, null, 

  32:    int.Parse(Params["warningsitecount"].Value),

  33:    int.Parse(Params["maxsites"].Value), (status == SPObjectStatus.Online?0:1));

  34:   

  35:   if (Params["searchserver"].UserTypedIn && !string.IsNullOrEmpty(Params["searchserver"].Value))

  36:   {

  37:    // If they specified a search server then we need to try and find a valid

  38:    // matching search server using the server address property.

  39:    SPSearchService service = SPFarm.Local.Services.GetValue<SPSearchService>("SPSearch");

  40:    SPServiceInstance searchServiceServer = null;

  41:    foreach (SPServiceInstance tempsvc in service.Instances)

  42:    {

  43:     if (!(tempsvc is SPSearchServiceInstance))

  44:      continue;

  45:  

  46:     if (tempsvc.Status != SPObjectStatus.Online)

  47:      continue;

  48:  

  49:     if (tempsvc.Server.Address.ToLowerInvariant() == Params["searchserver"].Value.ToLowerInvariant())

  50:     {

  51:      // We found a match so bug out of the loop.

  52:      searchServiceServer = tempsvc;

  53:      break;

  54:     }

  55:    }

  56:    if (searchServiceServer != null)

  57:    {

  58:     db.SearchServiceInstance = searchServiceServer;

  59:    }

  60:    else

  61:     throw new Exception("Search server not found.");

  62:   }

  63:   else if (Params["searchserver"].UserTypedIn)

  64:   {

  65:    // The user specified the searchserver switch with no value which is what we use to indicate

  66:    // clearing the value.

  67:    db.SearchServiceInstance = null;

  68:   }

  69:  

  70:   db.Update();

  71:  }

  72:  

  73:  return 1;

  74: }

The syntax of the command can be seen below:

C:\>stsadm -help gl-createcontentdb

stsadm -o gl-createcontentdb

Creates a new content database.

Parameters:
        -dbname <content database name>
        -webapp <web application url>
        [-dbserver <content database server>]
        [-maxsites <<maximum number of sites allowed in the db (default is 15000)>]
        [-warningsitecount <number of sites before a warning event is generated (default is 9000)>]
        [-searchserver <search server (leave empty to clear the search server)>]
        [-dbuser <database username (if using SQL Authentication and not Windows Authentication)>]
        [-dbuser <database username (if using SQL Authentication and not Windows Authentication)>]
        [-dbpwd <database password (if using SQL Authentication and not Windows Authentication)>]
        [-status <online | disabled>]

Here's an example of how to create a new content database:

stsadm -o gl-createcontentdb -dbname "SharePoint_ContentDB1" -webapp "http://intranet" -maxsites 500 -warningsitecount 400