I, along with Paul Stork, recently gave a SharePoint 2010 deployment webcast where we discussed, among other things, Service Applications and some of the considerations that must be taken into account when planning your deployment strategy. We also presented a first look at SharePoint Composer and SharePoint Maestro, the two core products that ShareSquared has been developing for close to a year now.

During the presentation we mentioned that there were some great charts available to help you in planning your Service Applications but that they weren’t the easiest thing to find as they are buried in a series of technical diagrams on TechNet. You can find two of the three charts we referenced at this link, http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263199.aspx. I’ve also added another chart which shows the dependencies of one Service Application to another (note that this particular chart is a work in progress as we are still discovering odd dependency cases that only occur in certain situations).

Chart 1: Service Applications per SKU

The first chart identifies all the core Service Applications and whether they store data, can be used cross-farm, and to which SharePoint SKU they belong. This chart is particularly useful in planning your initial licensing requirements:

Service applicationsDescriptionStores data?Cross-farm?SharePoint Foundation 2010SharePoint Server 2010 StandardSharePoint Server 2010 Enterprise
Access ServicesView, edit, and interact with Microsoft® Access® 2010 databases in a browser.CacheX
Business Data ConnectivityAccess line-of-business (LOB) data systems.DBXXXX
Excel Services ApplicationViewing and interact with Excel files in a browser.CacheX
Managed Metadata ServiceAccess managed taxonomy hierarchies, keywords and social tagging infrastructure as well as Content Type publishing across site collections.DBXXX
PerformancePointProvides the capabilities of PerformancePoint Services.CacheX
SearchCrawls content, produces index partitions, and serves search queries.DBXXX
Secure Store ServiceProvides single sign-on authentication to access multiple applications or services.DBXXX
State ServiceProvides temporary storage of user session data for SharePoint Server components.DBXX
Usage and Health Data CollectionCollects farm wide usage and health data and provides the ability to view various usage and health reports.DBXXX
User ProfileAdds support for My Sites, Profiles pages, Social Tagging and other social computing features.DBXXX
Visio Graphics ServiceViewing and refresh of published Microsoft® Visio® diagrams in a Web browser.Blob cacheX
Web AnalyticsProvides Web Service interfaces.XXX
Word Automation ServicesPerforms automated bulk document conversions.CacheXX
Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Subscription Settings ServiceTracks subscription IDs and settings for services that are deployed in partitioned mode. Windows PowerShell only.DBXXX

Source:

Visio (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=167090)

PDF (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=167092)

XPS (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=167091)

Chart 2: Databases That Support SharePoint 2010 Products

This next chart takes what was in diagram form in the original TechNet diagram and displays it in a chart so that it’s a bit easier to read. Use this chart when planning your SQL Server storage requirements:

Service Application DatabaseDatabaseRelative SizeSize Guidance
Usage and Health Data Collection Service ApplicationUsageExtra-largeScale up. Only one database service application per farm. Place on separate spindle.
Business Data Connectivity Service ApplicationBusiness Data ConnectivitySmallScale up.
Application Registry Service ApplicationApplication Registry (used during upgrade only)SmallScale up.
Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Subscription Settings ServiceSubscription SettingsSmallScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
Search Service ApplicationSearch AdministrationMediumScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
Search Service ApplicationCrawlExtra-largeScale out. For large environments, put on a server that does not contain the Property databases.
Search Service ApplicationPropertyLarge to Extra-largeScale out. For large environments, put on its own server for faster query results.
Web Analytics Service ApplicationReportingExtra-largeScale up.
Web Analytics Service ApplicationStagingMediumScale out.
State Service Application, Visio Service Application, InfoPath Forms ServicesStateMedium-largeScale out.
User Profile Service ApplicationProfileMedium-largeScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
User Profile Service ApplicationSynchronizationMedium-largeScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
User Profile Service ApplicationSocial TaggingSmall to Extra-largeScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
Managed Metadata Service ApplicationManaged MetadataMediumScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
Secure Store Service ApplicationSecure StoreSmallScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.
Word Automation Service ApplicationWord Automation ServicesSmallScale up.
PerformancePoint Service ApplicationPerformancePointSmallScale up. You can scale out by creating additional service applications.

Source:

Visio (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=187970)

PDF (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=187969)

XPS (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=187971)

Chart 3: Service Application Dependencies

This last chart is one that we’ve been manually constructing based on our experiences with automating the setup of Service Applications. When doing a scripted install (or even when you use the FCW or manually configure Service Applications) it’s critical to know which Service Applications are dependents for other Service Applications. For example, if you are configuring the User Profile Service Application you must also configure the Managed Metadata Service Application. If you don’t do this you will get errors stating that certain fields cannot be edited when editing a user’s profile – these errors don’t give any indication that what’s missing is the Managed Metadata Service Application – you just have know.

The following chart is an attempt to help users with this hurdle – note that it is still a work in progress as it is very difficult to detect all dependencies as some are only a dependency under certain usage scenarios. Anything with an asterisks (*) next to the “X” indicates that the dependency is conditional based on usage scenarios:

Service ApplicationsAccessBusiness Data ConnectivityExcel ServicesManaged MetadataPerformancePointFoundation SearchEnterprise SearchSecure StoreStateUsage and Health DataUser ProfileVisio GraphicsWeb AnalyticsWord AutomationSubscription Settings
AccessX
Business Data ConnectivityX*X*
Excel ServicesX*
Managed MetadataX*
PerformancePointX*
Foundation Search
Enterprise SearchX*XX*X*
Secure StoreX*
State
Usage and Health Data Collection
User ProfileX*X*X*X*
Visio GraphicsX*X
Web AnalyticsX
Word AutomationX*
Subscription Settings

The way you read this chart is to find the Service Application of interest on the left and follow it to the right to see what Service Application it depends on. As you can see there’s not a lot of dependencies and most of the ones that do exist are conditional (for example, all the ones that depend on the Subscription Settings Service Application only depend on it if using Partitioning Mode, or basically a multi-tenant configuration).

As this chart is a work in progress I appreciate any feedback on it’s accuracy. If anyone notices anything that is incorrect with the chart please add a comment and I will be sure to update it accordingly.