This installation topic describes installation and configuration details of the V-Suite CORE Database Server. The database server provides data services to connected V-Suite CORE clients and to V-Suite CORE Services. Customers who do not have a Microsoft SQL Server Enterprise/Standard Edition license may choose to install Microsoft SQL Server on the same computer as the Visionaize Enterprise Server (VES). You must manually install and configure the Microsoft SQL Server. 


In this topic 

Requirements

System Requirements

  • Microsoft SQL Server 2012, 2014, 2016, 2017 0r 2019 (Express edition is supported, Standard or Enterprise Editions are recommended).

Information

These minimum requirements only apply for a SQL Server instance for V-Suite CORE. Please note that the SQL Server Installation for V-Suite WEB has additional requirements. Customers who plan to install a SQL Server instance for both V-Suite CORE and V-Suite WEB must meet the following minimum requirements:

Express edition's and Microsoft SQL Server 2014 SP1 or earlier are not supported for V-Suite WEB.


Network Requirements

There is a substantial amount of network traffic between V-Suite CORE clients and database server and although a connection through VPN is supported it is highly recommended that V-Suite CORE clients connect to the database server over a high bandwidth, low latency network connection.

SQL Server Installation

Although it possible to configure V-Suite CORE VES with an existing (shared) Database Engine Instance, it is highly recommended that you install a V-Suite CORE dedicated instance. Refer to this Microsoft article for more details on database engine instances.

It is assumed that you have either downloaded the SQL Server Installer from the Microsoft download center or have purchased Microsoft provided installation media. Users not familiar with SQL Server installation should consult the following procedure.


This procedure is based on the SQL 2014 SP2 installer but is typical for SQL 2016, 2017 and 2019 with some exceptions.

After you have installed Microsoft SQL Server on the database server, you must make sure to configure the (windows) firewall to allow access to the database services.

Information

For local installations, you must run setup as an administrator.



On the V-Suite database server launch the SQL Server installer. 

Click Installation in the left-hand navigation area, and then click New SQL Server stand-alone installation or add features to an existing installation.





    • On the Product Key page, select an option to indicate whether you are installing a free edition of SQL Server, or a production version of the product that has a PID key. To continue, click Next.
    • On the License Terms page, review the license agreement and, if you agree, select the I accept the license terms checkbox, and then click Next. To help improve SQL Server, you can also enable the feature usage option and send reports to Microsoft.
    • In the Global Rules window, the setup procedure will automatically advance to the Product Updates window if there are no rule errors.
    • The Microsoft Update page will appear next if the Microsoft Update check box in Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Windows Update\Change settings is not checked. Putting a check in the Microsoft Update page will change the computer settings to include the latest updates when you scan for Windows Update.
    • On the Product Updates page, the latest available SQL Server product updates are displayed. If no product updates are discovered, SQL Server Setup does not display this page and auto advances to the Install Setup Files page.
    • On the Install Setup files page, Setup provides the progress of downloading, extracting, and installing the Setup files. If an update for SQL Server Setup is found and is specified to be included, that update will also be installed.


On the Setup Role page, select SQL Server Feature Installation



Click Next to continue to the Feature Selection page. 


On the Feature Selection page, select the components for your installation. As a minimum select the following:

  • Database Engine Services

If you install a SQL Instance for both V-Suite CORE and V-Suite WEB also select the following:Integration Services

  • Management Tools - Basic (Recommended)

Information

The SQL Server 2017 installation wizard no longer offers Management Tools as part of the Feature Selection page. Installation is not required for V-Suite, however SQL Server Management Studio is a useful general database management tool for DBA's and in SQL Server 2017 is installed separately.



Click Next to continue to the Instance Configuration page. 


On the Instance Configuration page, select whether you wish to install a default instance or a named instance. Specify the name of the instance if you choose named instance.


Make a note of the instance name, you will later need it to configure VES.


Click Next to continue to the Server Configuration page. 



On the Server Configuration page, on the Service Accounts tab, use the default account names and make sure that the Startup Type for all services is set to Automatic. 


Information

The SQL Server Browser service is not required. The SQL Server Agent and SQL Server Integration Services are not required if you install SQL for V-Suite CORE only, these services are only required if you install for both V-Suite CORE and V-Suite WEB.


On the Collation tab verify the database engine is set to "SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS".



Click Next to continue to the Database Engine Configuration page. 

 
On the Database Engine Configuration page, on the Server Configuration tab, choose either Windows authentication mode or Mixed Mode. If you selected Mixed Mode you are prompted to enter the password for the SQL Server system administrator (sa) account:


You must identify at least one SQL Server administrator windows account. Click Add Current User to add your windows account as a system administrator or click the Add button to add other windows users.



Make a note of which accounts you added as system administrators. You will need one of these accounts to later log in to SQL to configure VES.


Click Next to continue. 


On the Ready to Install page, click the Install button to complete the installation.




Configure SQL Server TCP Port

V-Suite CORE communicates with the Microsoft SQL Server Database Engine via TCP. Each SQL Instance on the database server will use a different port. The default instance of the Database Engine uses port 1433, but that can be changed. Instances of SQL Server Express and named instances of the Database Engine use dynamic ports ('VSUITE' is a named instanced). That means that every time that the Database Engine starts, it identifies an available port and uses that port number. If the named instance is the only instance of the Database Engine installed, it will probably use TCP port 1433. If other instances of the Database Engine are installed, it will probably use a different TCP port. Because the port selected might change every time that the Database Engine is started, it is difficult to configure the firewall to enable access to the correct port number. Therefore, if a firewall is used, we recommend reconfiguring the Database Engine to use the same port number every time. This is called a fixed port or a static port. Refer to this article to configure an SQL Server instance fixed port. If V-Suite CORE is connecting to a named SQL instance it will also need to communicate with the SQL Browser Service via UDP port 1434. Refer to this article for detailed information about configuring Windows Firewall to allow SQL Server access. 

V-Suite CORE Database Folders

Before you configure VES you must create V-Suite CORE default data folders. Create these folders on the database server where you have installed Microsoft SQL Server. The following is an example of how you could organize these folders:

It is recommended that you create 3 separate folders, one for the Project Databases, one for the VES Administration Database and one for the Project backups and Satellite databases. This is not a requirement but as a minimum you should separate the backup folder from the database folder(s) so that the backup folder can be shared and is accessible by the V-Suite Administrator (in order to be able to load/exchange backup files). The database folders do not have to be shared but you must make sure that the SQL Database Engine service has the appropriate access rights to the database folder and backup folders. Refer to this article for configuring the file system permissions for SQL Server 2012 and up.