In Part I of this topic we covered the considerations for content type publishing that relate to keyword/managed terms. In this part we’ll cover considerations for content type publishing as they relate to content type administration.
Again, the content type hub is the designated site collection that will be used to publish and administer content types to all subscribing sites. There can only be one content type hub per Managed Metadata Service (MMS) service application and any site in a web app that has a connection to the service application will be a subscriber to the content type hub. One key thing to keep in mind is that a site can be a hub as well as a subscriber.
Administration and security in my experience is something that is typically comes after implementation which can be an issue in itself. With the new shift to designating the content type hub at the service application level in Central Administration, determining content type security and administration rights during planning becomes important.
There are two main options:
1.Store content types in a dummy site collection designated as the hub
2.Store content types in the site collection that is the main consumer of them and designate it as the hub
Configuration #1 – Separate Dummy Site Collection Hub
The separate dummy site collection approach to storing and administering content types allows for total isolation of content types. This allows for minimal consideration of security and permissions ahead of time as the site collection will only be accessed by farm or site collection administrators and only when content type administration and management needs to be completed.
This prevents the necessity of complex security and permissions configuration on a site collection and also limits the possibility of inadvertent content type changes.
The disadvantage to this approach is that an additional site collection and layer of complexity is added to an implementation.
Configuration #2 – Main Consumer Site Collection Hub
By storing content types in the main consumer site and designating it as the content type hub we would be using the most intuitive approach. This would be the most intuitive setup and the most desirable for simple implementations where little division of administration is necessary.
The disadvantage to this approach is that security and permissions need to be considered as all site collection administrators as well as site Owners will have the ability to publish, change or remove content types which will affect all subscribers.
Conclusion
During planning have a realistic conversation about administration and division of labor. For most implementations, storing content types in the main consumer site and making it the content type publishing hub will suffice. However, if there will be multiple permission levels or different types of administrators with varying degrees of permissions, then opt for storing content types in a dummy site collection only for content type storage, administration and publishing.
