Its all about SharePoint!

Every now and then Microsoft manages to create a design that puzzles the hell out of me.  This time it is yet another issue with SharePoint 2007 Content Deployment.  When setting up your application for Content Deployment you go to the Central Admin and select “Content Deployment Settings”.  One of the settings here is the location where SharePoint will temporarily store CAB files while exporting and importing.

One should ensure that there is sufficient disk space available on the drive where you set the Temporary Content Deployment folder.  However, this is not enough.  You can still get an out of disk space error.  You see, Microsoft in its infinite wisdom uses yet another temporary folder.  Content Deployment is carried out by the Timer Service.  In its first step, the timer service gets data from the database and holds it in a temp area.  Once all the data is extracted CAB files are created and stored in the temp folder that you selected in the “Content Deployment Settings” in Central Admin.  The the files are moved to the destination machine to the temp folder selected on the destination machines Central Admin “Content Deployment Settings”.  Then the destination machine’s Timer Service will take these CAB files and extract their contents to a temp location before loading it into the database.

So what is this temp location that is used by the Timer Service?  Well, guess what?  It’s not the location you specified in Central Admin.  It is in fact the default USERPROFILE temp storage location for the user under which the Timer Service is running. 

If the Timer Service is running on Local System then the temp folder used is the system TEMP and TMP folders that defined as your Environment Variables. Usually C:\Windows\Temp.

If the Timer Service is running as a specific user or service account then the temp folder used is the users TEMP and TMP folders that defined as your Environment Variables.  Usually C:\Documents and Settings\The_User\Local Settings\Temp.

You can change these location via a registry change (HKEY_USER) or by modifying the environment variables to point to a drive that you know will always have ample space for your Content Deployment to work.

Also, note, if you ever change the user that runs the Timer Service, you will need to modify that user’s TEMP/TMP locations.