@title Configuring File Storage
@group config

Setup how Phabricator will store files.

= Overview =

Phabricator allows users to upload files, and several applications use file
storage (for instance, Maniphest allows you to attach files to tasks). You can
configure several different storage systems:

  - you can store data in MySQL: this is the easiest to set up, but doesn't
    scale well;
  - you can store data on local disk: this is also easy to set up but won't
    scale to multiple web frontends without NFS;
  - or you can build a custom storage engine.

By default, Phabricator is configured to store files up to 1MB in MySQL, and
reject files larger than 1MB. It is recommended you set up local disk storage
for files larger than 1MB. This should be sufficient for most installs. If you
have a larger install or more unique requirements, you may want to customize
this further.

For technical documentation (including instructions on building custom storage
engines) see @{article:File Storage Technical Documentation}.

You don't have to fully configure this immediately, the defaults are okay until
you need to upload larger files and it's relatively easy to port files between
storage engines later.

= Storage Engines =

Builtin storage engines and information on how to configure them.

== MySQL ==

  - **Pros**: Fast, no setup required.
  - **Cons**: Storing files in a database is a classic bad idea. Does not scale
    well. Maximum file size is limited.

MySQL storage is configured by default, for files up to (just under) 1MB. You
can configure it with these keys:

  - ##storage.mysql-engine.max-size##: Change the filesize limit. Note that
    this must be smaller than 'max_allowed_packet' on the server. Set to 0
    to disable.

For most installs, it is recommended you configure local disk storage below,
and then either leave this as is or disable it, depending on how upset you feel
about putting files in a database.

== Local Disk ==

  - **Pros**: Very simple. Almost no setup required.
  - **Cons**: Doesn't scale to multiple web frontends without NFS.

For most installs, it is **strongly recommended** that you configure local disk
storage. To do this, set the configuration key:

  - ##storage.local-disk.path##: Set to some writable directory on local disk.
    Make that directory. You're done.

== Amazon S3 ==

  - **Pros**: Scales well.
  - **Cons**: More complicated and expensive than other approaches.

To enable file storage in S3, set these key:

  - ##amazon-s3.access-key## Your AWS access key.
  - ##amazon-s3.secret-key## Your AWS secret key.
  - ##storage.s3.bucket## S3 bucket name where files should be stored.

== Custom Engine ==

For details about writing a custom storage engine, see @{article:File Storage
Technical Documentation}.

= Testing Storage Engines =

You can test that things are correctly configured by going to the Files
application (##/file/##) and uploading files.

= Next Steps =

Continue by:

  - configuring file size upload limits with
    @{article:Configuring File Upload Limits}; or
  - returning to the @{article:Configuration Guide}.