We've been testing FILESTREAM with ERSI Attachments. You might be OK using it as long as you don't need to replicate or move the data. Essentially, enable attachments on a feature class. Go to you SQL database and enable and configure FILESTREAM. In SQL, go to the ##_ATTACH table that was created from enabling attachments. Generate the SQL code to create the table. Delete the ##_ATTACH table. Modify the SQL code to add a rowguidcol at the beginning and set the DATA field to fe the FILESTREAM field. My query statement is below. For some reason I had to add an extra [varbinary] at the end for the statement. I just deleted the field after the table was created. At this point I was able to add attachments in desktop and you could go to the folder on the server where you specified as the FILESTREAM folder and see some files were created. I haven't figured out how to move it yet because XML export fails on a table with FILESTREAM enabled.
CREATE TABLE [GIS].[FACILITYSITEPOINT__ATTACH](
[RowNumber][uniqueidentifier] rowguidcol not null unique, (ADDED this field)
[ATTACHMENTID] [int] NOT NULL,
[REL_OBJECTID] [int] NOT NULL,
[CONTENT_TYPE] [nvarchar](150) NOT NULL,
[ATT_NAME] [nvarchar](250) NOT NULL,
[DATA_SIZE] [int] NOT NULL,
[DATA] [varbinary](max) FileStream NULL, (Set this field as FIELSTREAM)
[FileStream] [varbinary](max) NULL (Added and deleted this field)
) ON [PRIMARY] TEXTIMAGE_ON [PRIMARY]
To follow up what @Dave Frame said we are testing it now ourselves. We recently used AGO to build a collection using the Collector app. We puled the data down from AGO to push into our enterprise running on SQL 2012. Our next steps will be to use the below link to try and shift the images collected into the filestream.
Adding FILESTREAM to an existing table in a database in SQL 2008 R2
Still unsure how this change will carry through to usage within ArcMap, or even more so how it will work when we try to publish this data set for use in a service but will try to keep people updated as we push it forward.
Having a discussion with ESRI reps tomorrow about getting them to leverage Filestream capabilities. Part of what they brought to our attention was the new site they are using for "Enhancement Requests". I did a few searches there and did not find this over there so I have started up things there. Here is the link
ESRI has opend up a Bug/Enhancement request for this topic.
Bug ENH-000087562: Allow data storage to utilize SQL Server FILESTREAM capability with ArcSDE geodatabases.
Anyone interested in this functionality can contact ESRI support and ask to be added to Bug ENH-000087562. The more users that want this functionality, the faster it will be done.
Dave Frame thanks for the info and I will be sure to bring that up to them when I speak with them today. Great to see this is getting attention and being worked on.