My application stores data on Enterprise edition sql server, and I plan to take advantage of table partitioning to manage data retention. Each partition will hold a predefined period of time (say one week) and the user knows that. The user may have several disk drives they may want to use to place data. I want to create a simple UI that makes the partitioning configuration more user-friendly for a user or administrator. My sql code will handle the config and management of partitions. The UI tool will let the user add partitions by specifying their folder path in case they want to put them in different drives. Through my UI tool, the user adds partitions, say 8, and specifies their paths. 8 partitions in this case will give my user a data retention of 2 months (8 weeks). Once they apply the changes, my code takes that information and does the sql plumbing configuration. My question: is this a reasonable UI? does it have any pitfalls? anything I should consider? what happens if the user reconfigure the partitions a week later, say, attempts to change the folder location of a specific partition - is it even possible to move a live partition?
Any feedback will be appreciated, thanks!
