My IT Experiences

Farm solution VS Sandbox solution

2011-10-18T12:45:00.008+05:30

Here is a comparison between SharePoint 2010 farm solution and Sandbox solution

Feature	Farm Solution	Sandbox Solution
Deploying the solution	The farm solution is added directly to the SharePoint server and then deployed to the farm. It is deployed by the farm administrator.	The Sandbox solution is uploaded using the Solution Gallery interface of the site collection and then activated. And the solution is deployed by the site collection administrator or a user with full privilege.
Running the solution	The farm solution uses an IIS worker process with unrestricted rights.	The Sandbox solution uses a separate worker process to access and execute the data.
Accessing the data	A farm solution has complete access to all the content at the farm level.	A Sandbox solution uses a separate worker process to access and execute the data. This restricts the data availability at the site collection level alone.
Securing the solution	The farm solution is not governed by any access security but the developer can set the code access when packaging the solution.	The Sandbox solution is governed and protected by the .NET Code Access Security or CAS policy.
Monitoring the solution	The solutions deployed in the farm are not monitored.	The site collection administrator monitors the Sandbox solution based on the restrictions provided by the farm administrator.
Balancing the load	The load balancing used in a farm solution depends on the type of solution that is deployed.	The load balancing used in a Sandbox solution is configured outside the sandbox.

Deleting large lists using PowerShell

2011-08-25T21:45:00.001+05:30

Excellent one from Todd Klindt: http://www.toddklindt.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=261

Detected use of SPRequest for previously closed SPWeb object

2011-07-22T16:36:00.003+05:30

I was working on configuring a SharePoint 2010 farm and I received this error while trying to create an Enterprise Search Center on the root site collection.:

Detected use of SPRequest for previously closed SPWeb object. Please close SPWeb objects when you are done with all objects obtained from them, but not before. Stack trace: at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ScriptLink.SharePointClientJs_Register(Page page) at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ScriptLink.InitJs_Register(Page page) at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ScriptLink.RegisterForControl(Control ctrl, Page page, String name, Boolean localizable, Boolean defer, Boolean loadAfterUI, String language) at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ScriptLink.Register(Page page, String name, Boolean localizable, Boolean defer, Boolean loadAfterUI, String language, String uiVersion) at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ScriptLink.RegisterOnDemand(Page page, String strKey, String

I tried creating a blank site and a basic search center and there were no errors. It seemed that this error had something to do with some site collection level features. I activate the SharePoint Standard and Enterprise features and tried creating an Enterprise Search Center sub-site on the root site collection, result was same. I checked the ULS logs and the error was still the same.

I tried activating the SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure and then recreated the Enterprise Center, this time it worked like a charm!

The sad part is that nothing much can be inferred from the ULS log message.

There was this another error for the same corelation Id:

No document templates uploaded for list "$Resources:core,MasterPageGallery;" -- none found for list template "100".

Not sure what this really means, but I'm happy that the problem is solved.

Login prompt while opening Office documents on SharePoint library

2011-06-24T16:04:00.002+05:30

This is a very common that we get authentication dialoge box while trying to edit an Office document on a SharePoint library from Internet. This happens even if you are logged in to your site using browser. It is frustrating for end user because he/she has provided credentials once before loggin in to the site and now when tried to open/edit a document (Word, Excel etc) again the credntial window pops up.

Quoting Microsoft:
"When Internet Explorer opens an Office document, the appropriate Office application is started with the path of the document. The Office application then tries to access the document directly from the server. This differs from other browsers and other file types. Most browsers download the file and call the application to open the file from the local cache. However, when this occurs, if the opened file is changed and saved, the changes are only made to the local copy and not to the server copy.

To establish the richest experience possible, the first thing that the Office application does is communicate with the server to determine the server type and what web authoring protocol is available. The application does this by making an OPTIONS request directly to the server.

As a new process accessing the server, the Office application is required to renegotiate authentication. This method is more secure than a method in which the new process uses an existing authentication that was established by the browser."

Suggested work arounds are:
- Using Forms Based Authentication (FBA) with persistent cookies
- Leave the application open
- Select "remember the password" while logging in to FBA site

Here are some articles that provide more details on this issue:
Multiple Logon while open office Document from SharePoint
http://blogs.technet.com/b/steve_chen/archive/2010/06/25/multiple-logon-while-open-office-document-from-sharepoint.aspx

Authentication requests when you open Office documents
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2019105

How to Configure Persistent Cookies on ISA 2006
http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/oshria/archive/2009/02/16/how-to-configure-persistence-cookies-in-isa-2006.aspx

Login prompt appearing when opening Office documents
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sharepointadmin/thread/45feb132-c304-4521-8b79-42236a829aab

Configuring PerformancePoint Services in SharePoint 2010

2011-05-30T14:40:00.036+05:30

PerformancePoint Service (PPS) is used to create content rich dashboards that aggregate data and content throwing light in to how business is performing.

PPS was not part of MOSS 2007 but with SharePoint 2010 Microsoft has integrated PPS as a service within. Dashboard Designer is the tool using which we can author KPIs, Scorecards, reports, etc.

Lets take a look at the steps involved in configuring PPS on a SharePoint 2010 Server farm.

1. Select Start -> All Programs -> Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Products -> SharePoint 2010 Central Administration. Click "Manage Service Applications" under Application Management. On the ribbon, Click on the Arrow below "New" and select "PerformancePoint Service Application".

2. Enter a name for this service application, select/create an application pool, and associate a managed account.

3. We get a confirmation screen on the service application successfully created. I had used the name "Performance_App" for this service application

4. Next we have to create a secure store service and turn the PerformancePoint service on. Without configuring Secure Store you cannot use PerformancePoint’s unattended service account to connect to data sources. The unattended account cannot use the application pool identity to connect to data sources which used to be the case in previous version. It must use a domain account, whose password is stored in the secure store.

To create Secure Store navigate to Managed Service Application and click New and select Secure Store Service.

5. After filling in the details and clicking on Ok throws an error; I have to create a new key for this Secure Store application.

6. Click on Generate New Key on the ribbon and enter the Pass Phrase

7. Click on Refresh Key, this would propagate encryption key to all application servers.

8. PPS web application is created now

9. Next we have to configure PPS, to do this Click on the newly created PPS application - click Manage - Click on "PerformancePoint Service Application Settings"

10. Configure unattended account

11. Final step, we need to associate the our web application to PPS service application. To do so, navigate to Central Administration - Application Management - under Service Applications - click configure service application associations

12. I configure it for my default web application

13. Select the PPS service application and click Ok

The PerformancePoint service application is configured.

MCITP today

2011-05-14T15:25:00.001+05:30

I cleared the SharePoint 070-668 exam today, now I'm an MCITP in SharePoint 2010 :)

Access is Denied, Exception from HRESULT: 0X80070005

2011-05-09T15:20:00.003+05:30

I'm not a fan of re-posting content but I'm doing it so that the possibility of somebody finding a solution for this error increases.

I received the following error while trying to schedule a crawl on our SharePoint farm:

I was able to start a full or incremental crawl and it would complete successfully and this led to the possibility of some issue with scheduling mechanism. Now SharePoint would leverage Windows tasks scheduler to schedule events from SharePoint and so it makes sense that this error disappears when we explicitly provide the local server group "WSS_WPG" read and write permission on the "Tasks" folder within Windows folder on the Index server.

Here are the steps (Close all explorer windows before performing these steps):

1. Start - Run - type "Cmd" and execute the following command:

attrib -s %windir%\tasks

This is done so that the "Security" tab appears in the Tasks properties window.

2. Right click Windows\Tasks folder and navigate to Properties - Security tab

3. Add the group "WSS_WPG" group with Read and Write permission. Make sure the location is set to local server and not domain because this group is a local group.

4. Start - Run - type "Cmd" and execute the following command:

attrib +s %windir%\tasks

There were few blogs and a MS article that discuss about this issue:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/926959

http://www.dzeee.net/sharepoint/post/2010/01/17/Crawl-Scheduling-Error-Access-Denied.aspx

Issue with Save to SharePoint in Excel 2010

2011-05-05T11:43:00.006+05:30

I was trying out Excel 2010 for the first time and working with Excel services. I created an Excel workbook with OOB sales template and wanted to check the Excel service features offered by SharePoint 2010. While trying to publish the workbook to a document library from Excel - Save & Send - Save to SharePoint - Browse for a location - Save As

I received an error which said “Path does not exist. Check the path and try again”

I initially thought this would be an issue with the copy of Excel 2010 I had. But after doing some research it seemed the issue was related to the OS environment I was in because I could publish the same file from Windows 7 machine using similar Excel 2010 version.
To get this working from Windows Server 2008 we need to enable a feature “Desktop Experience” from Server Manager

Once I enabled this feature I could successfully publish the workbook.

Difference between the architectures of SSPs and SharePoint Service Application

2011-04-06T21:30:00.001+05:30

SharePoint 2010 has some new features and components, which help to overcome difficulties such as redundancy and service-sharing that we faced while using SharePoint 2007.

Services in MOSS 2007 were implemented with the help of Shared Service Providers or SSPs. But we cannot use the services of one SSP for another SSP. So each SSP has to have its own set of services and applications, which increases redundant data in the farm.

For example, different managers in the same organization use a SharePoint site to maintain official data associated with an SSP. This SSP is associated with different services, such as Search service, BDC service, and a user profile service. A project manager in this organization requests an exclusive user profile service to maintain project data security. To provide this, we first need to create a separate SSP for the project manager and then a separate service called user profile service - project name. Next, we need to associate the SSP with the service and configure the user profiles service for the manager. However, when we do this, the project manager will not be able to access the Search service and BDC service. So you need to associate the Search service and the BDC service for this SSP as well.

If there are numerous similar requests, then it will lead to data redundancy.

SharePoint 2007 architecture

In SharePoint 2010, this redundancy and service-sharing issue is resolved because SSPs are replaced by Shared Service Applications or SSAs. Commonly known as service applications, SSAs allow services to be shared across farms and web applications.

Suppose that the organization that uses SharePoint 2007 for maintaining department data were to upgrade to SharePoint 2010. SharePoint 2010 would contain a web application, WebApplication1, connected to a User Profile and services such as Search service and BDC service. The project manager's request for an exclusive user profile service would now be implemented differently.

We would create a web application, WebApplication2, and provide a user profile service application exclusively for this web application. Then, you would be able to associate the web application with all service applications shared across the web application. So the project manager would be able to access the other service applications in addition to using the new service application, which eliminates the scaling issues that exist with SSPs.

SharePoint 2010 Architecture

Besides these differences in their ability to share services, the architectures of SSP and SSA have many other differences, as listed in the "Differences between the SSA and SSP architectures table"

Differences between the SSA and SSP architectures
Feature	SSP architecture	SSA architecture
Service sharing	Each SSP has its own set of services and applications. You can't share services between two SSPs. So you need to configure new services for every new SSP.	Services are present in the form of service applications that can be shared across web applications in a farm, and some of them can even be shared across farms.
Configuration	Each web application can only be associated with a single SSP, so the same services need to be configured for every SSP. This causes redundancy, duplication of services, and major scaling issues.	You can associate the same web application with multiple SSAs, which provides flexibility in configuration.
Environment	It is easy to manage an isolated SSPs environment, because each SSP has its own set of services and applications.	It is difficult to manage an SSA environment because of shared services.

Besides providing service applications, SSAs provide several other benefits like;

• reduce incompatibilities that may be faced while administering SharePoint 2007, because service applications are part of all products in SharePoint 2010, including SharePoint Foundation
• allow services to be shared across farms and reduce redundancy, and
• make configuration flexible, because service applications have a many-to-many relationship with web applications

Removing cluster resource fails SQL Server cluster service

2011-03-22T12:15:00.000+05:30

We have a SQL Server 2005 cluster with two nodes, one active and the other passive. We had to remove an 1 TB storage volume from the cluster and release it to the storage pool.

Before removing any cluster resource we need to remove the dependencies. To remove this drive we have to remove the dependency of this drive from SQL Server service. Here are the steps:

1. Open cluster administrator

2. Right click SQL Service and select Properties

3. Click Modify and remove the resource from Modify Dependencies window

4. Now we can go back to Cluster Administrator and delete the resource/drive volume.

If we delete the drive or resource without removing the dependency, the SQL Service might fail to start. The following errors might occur:

TDSSNIClient initialization failed with error 0x103, status code 0x1.

Could not start the network library because of an internal error in the network library. To determine the cause, review the errors immediately preceding this one in the error log.

SQL Server could not spawn FRunCM thread. Check the SQL Server error log and the Windows event logs for information about possible related problems.

The cause is that certain registry values that got deleted. In our case it was "parameters" and "RegSync" values that got deleted from the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Cluster\Resources\

For more information refer to this excellent post:
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqldisasterrecovery/thread/af054e22-4b36-4793-a87d-120002ae215f

Cleared 70-667 SharePoint 2010

2011-03-22T11:12:00.001+05:30

I cleared the SharePoint 2010 configuration exam 70 - 667 the other day. I got 91% of the questions correct this time.

There were some questions that were confusing but the test was not very difficult. I believe the set of questions around search and Powershell is what wrong for me.

I plan to do 70 - 668 next!

I cleared the 70-630 exam :)

2011-01-13T07:25:00.000+05:30

I cleared the Microsoft certification exam for SharePoint 2007, the MCTS for MOSS 2007 configuring 70-630 on Monday this week. The score was 1000 out of 1000 :)

There were 76 questions and I had to go for the best answer for around 15 of them because it was bit tough, but I made it through.

SharePoint 2010 Central Admin database GUID

2011-01-07T16:23:00.006+05:30

I got some inspiration reading the Technet article Deploy by using DBA-created databases (SharePoint Server 2010) the other day. We can deploy SharePoint 2010 without the central administration (CA) database having the annoying GUID.

If we run the SharePoint configuration Wizard after installation it will create content database with GUID. However, if we create CA content database using PowerShell we can have the database name of our choice. I have also referred to the SPModule PowerShell Scripts available from Microsoft. Here are the steps:

1. Run Setup on each server computer in the farm. You must run Setup on at
least one of these computers by using the Complete installation option.

2. Do not run the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard after Setup
finishes.

From the SharePoint 2010 Management Shell, use the
New-SPConfigurationDatabase command to create a new configuration database,,for example:

New-SPConfigurationDatabase -DatabaseName "SharePoint_Config"
-DatabaseServer "SQL_DB" -Passphrase (ConvertTo-SecureString "MyPassword"
-AsPlainText -force) -FarmCredentials (Get-Credential)
-AdministrationContentDatabaseName "SharePoint_Admin_Content"

The cmdlet above creates a config db named “SharePoint_Config” and also
creates the central admin content database and names it
“SharePoint_Admin_Content”. Values in quotes in the above command can be
customized.

For more information, see New-SPConfigurationDatabase:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff607838.aspx

4. Run the following commands in order

a. #install help collections
Install-SPHelpCollection -All

b. #Secure resources
Initialize-SPResourceSecurity

c. #Install Services
Install-SPService

d. #Install Features
Install-SPFeature -AllExistingFeatures

e. #Provision Central Administration on port 2010
New-SPCentralAdministration -Port 2010 -WindowsAuthProvider "NTLM"

f. #Install Application content
Install-SPApplicationContent

This finishes the setup and provisions Central Administration website on port 2010.

Some of the files failed to copy during deployment of the solution

2011-01-07T14:18:00.003+05:30

We used to receive this error while deploying "wsp" files on our MOSS farm. This happened only on one WFE and not on the other. I was sure there was some process blocking the file deployment because this was happening only on one WFE.

After hours of head banging we figured out that we had a SharePoint backup third-party application configured on this WFE. This application was installed on this WFE. We had our production deployment window normally in the afternoon on weekedays and weekends. This error would not normally happen on the weekends. Combining all these we figured out that backup application was not running on weekend afternoons.

We checked with the storage management team here to pause or kill all backup jobs on a weekday that we had a scheduled "wsp" deployment. Amazingly we did not receive this error. Then we rescheduled the backup jobs accordingly so that it does not conflict with our code deployment window and the issue was solved.

Report Server has encountered a SharePoint error. ( rsSharePointError)

2011-01-07T13:40:00.005+05:30

I was receiving this error on the "Report Server Web Service URL" on our SharePoint farm:

Report Server has encountered a SharePoint error. ( rsSharePointError)

Access to this Web Site has been blocked. Please contact the administrator to resolve this problem.

This site URL is configured via Central Administration > Configure Reporting Services Integration > Reporting Services Integration if Reporting Server feature/Add-in is installed on the farm.

After doing some research I found out that this page somehow enumerates through entire site collections before it throws this error. As part of troubleshooting step I checked if the domain user configured for reporting service is has sufficient privileges in the farm and also as local admin of the sql box, but this did not solve the issue.

We raised this issue with the vendor and they made us update our SQL Server 2005 to latest SP and CU; still we had the error. The reason was nobody was sure if this error was related to MOSS or SQL server. We checked the reporting services log files but could not find much details on this error. Finally the vendor looked up his case archives and found that this error could occur of site collections are locked or set as No Access in Quotas and Locks page in Application Management. I ran the following command to check on the lock status of site collections of each web application:

stsadm –o enumsites –url -showlocks

We found out that there were couple of sites locked in mysites web application and I unlocked these sites. Then I navigated to the Report Server Web Service URL and I did not get the error, instead I saw a list of sites. I assume these sites are the ones which have reports deployed. I checked with the vendor who was working with me on this but they could not tell me the logic behind what sort of sites were populated in that page.

The SharePoint Worker Process Group Update job failed

2010-11-19T14:30:00.004+05:30

I was implementing a new SharePoint farm and I observed that web application that I create in Central Admin site was not getting created in the IIS of WFE servers.

The sites would be created in the WFE if I restart the WSS web application service through stsadm command. But this was not an option. I ran the stsadm execadmsvcjobs and it thew this error:

The SharePoint Worker Process Group Update job failed with the following error.

This job will be skipped. Failed to connect to an IPC Port: The system cannot find the file specified.

It turned out that the service "Windows SharePoint Services Administration" was stopped on all my MOSS servers. Once I started this service the issue was solved.

Make "This Site" as default search scope in SharePoint

2010-11-13T12:29:00.004+05:30

We had this requirement the other day to make "This Site" as default search scope in the search dropdown list on our SharePoint sites.

This setting is configured on a xml file "SearchArea" present in the features folder. Here are the steps to achieve this:

1. Navigate to C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\OSearchEnhancedFeature folder on the front end server(s)

2. Open the file "SearchArea.xml" in notepad

3. Add new property line just above closing control tag with Property Name as "DropDownMode" and value as "ShowDD_DefaultContextual"

4. Save and close the file. Do an IISRESET

Perform the following steps on all the WFE servers in the farm.

SharePoint 2010 Services

2010-11-12T18:20:00.004+05:30

Here is a brief on the services available in SharePoint 2010:

1. Access Database Service

Enables the publishing of Access databases to SharePoint 2010 to share them with others and to use Access site templates. Requires Microsoft Office Access

2010 to create and publish databases. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Access Services Farm Feature.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Servers, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Access Services.

References:

Access Services planning

Access Services administration

Build an Access database to share on the Web

Video on publishing access databases

2. Application Registry Service

Stores application definitions that are compatible with the Office SharePoint Server 2007 Business Data Catalog object model.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note: This service is not configurable.

3. Business Data Connectivity Service

Enables you to surface external data systems in SharePoint 2010 technology. This service provides connectivity to various types of external line-of-business

(LOB) data systems. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Offline Synchronization for External Lists.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Business Data Connectivity Service

References:

Business Connectivity Services

4. Central Administration

Runs the Central Administration site.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note This service is not configurable.

5. Claims to Windows Token Service

Enables a feature of Windows Identity Foundation that generates impersonation-level Windows security tokens so applications can impersonate users and access external back-end resources, such as SQL Server databases.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note This service is not configurable

References:

Configure the security token service (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

Configure the security token service (SharePoint Server 2010)

6. Document Conversions Launcher Service

Performs automated bulk document conversions. Schedules and initiates the conversion of documents on a server. When actively converting, this service will

fully utilize one CPU for each worker process (configured in Central Administration). If the service is started on multiple servers, a job will be shared

across all the servers. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, SharePoint Server Publishing, SharePoint Server Publishing

Infrastructure, and Publishing Approval Workflow.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

d. In the list of services, click Document Conversions Launcher Service.

References:

Manage document conversions (SharePoint Server 2010)

Configure Document Conversions Load Balancer and Launcher Services (SharePoint Server 2010)

Enable document converters for a Web application (SharePoint Server 2010)

7. Document Conversions Load Balancer Service

Balances document conversion requests from across the server farm. Each Web application can only have one load balancer registered with it at a time. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, SharePoint Server Publishing, SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure, and Publishing Approval Workflow.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

d. In the list of services, click Document Conversions Load Balancer Service.

References:

Manage document conversions (SharePoint Server 2010)

Document conversion load balancer unavailable (SharePoint 2010)

Configure Document Conversions Load Balancer and Launcher Services (SharePoint Server 2010)

8. Excel Calculation Services (Office Web Applications)

Enables the Excel Services Web Part, which makes it simple to use, share, secure, and manage Office Excel workbooks (.xslx, .xslb, .xlsm) as interactive reports and dashboards in a consistent way. Also used to prepare Office Excel workbooks for viewing and editing in a Web browser. Office Web Apps Services is a related service. Requires Microsoft Office Excel 2010 to create and publish workbooks.

This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, Office Web Apps, Excel Services Application Edit Farm Feature, Excel Services Application View Farm Feature, and Excel Services Application Web Part Farm Feature.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Excel Services Application.

References:

Excel Services

Excel Services overview (SharePoint Server 2010)

9. Lotus Notes Connector

Enables Lotus Notes Domino Servers to be crawled and searched by SharePoint Search 2010. Required to be running on at least one server in the farm, but can also be extended on more than one server to scale-out performance.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note This service is not configurable.

References:

Install connectors (SharePoint Server 2010)

10. Managed Metadata Web Service

Enables access to managed taxonomy hierarchies, the keywords and social tagging infrastructure, and content type publishing across site collections. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Metadata Navigation and Filtering.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Managed Metadata Service.

References:

Metadata management

Plan managed metadata (SharePoint Server 2010)

Managed metadata administration (SharePoint Server 2010)

11. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Administration Service (SPAdminV4)

A required service that runs on all servers in a Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 farm. This service performs multiple operations on the local server

computers that require local administrator permissions for operations; for example, creating and deleting Web applications and service applications, and starting and stopping services. If this service is not running on any server in a SharePoint Foundation 2010 farm, administrative operations can fail or partially succeed.

To re-start this service: At the command prompt, type:

SC CONFIG SPAdminV4 start= auto

SC START SPAdminV4

Note: This service is not configurable

12. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Incoming E-Mail

Enables SharePoint sites to receive and store e-mail messages and attachments in lists and libraries. Also enables the E-mail a Link command in the ribbon.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note This service is not configurable.

References:

Plan e-mail integration (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

E-mail integration (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

13. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Sandboxed Code Service

Enables sandboxed code solutions to run in a restricted execution environment so that problems that occur in the sandbox do not adversely affect the rest of the server environment.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note: This service is not configurable

References:

Sandboxed solutions planning (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

Sandboxed solutions planning (SharePoint Server 2010)

Sandboxed solutions administration (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

Sandboxed solutions administration (SharePoint Server 2010)

14. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Subscription Settings Service

Tracks subscription IDs and settings for services that are deployed in multitenant mode or if the farm includes sites using site subscriptions.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note: This service is not configurable.

15. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Tracing (SPTrace)

A required service on all Microsoft SharePoint Foundation servers that logs error messages on the server in the trace logs.

To re-start this service, at the command prompt, type:

net start SPTrace

Note: This service is not configurable.

References:

Tracing service not running (SharePoint 2010)

16. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application

Runs a web application, which is an Internet Information Services (IIS) Web site that is created and used by SharePoint 2010 technology.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note: This service is not configurable

17. Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Workflow Timer Service

Runs most system tasks.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

d. In the list of services, click Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Workflow Timer Service.

18. Office Web Apps Services

A collection of three services: Excel Calculation Services, PowerPoint Service, and Word Viewing Service. Office Web apps is a web-based productivity offering from Microsoft Office 2010 that includes four products: Office Word app, Office Excel app, Office PowerPoint app, and Office OneNote 2010 app, which is the only web app that does not use a service. Requires Microsoft Office 2010 Standard or Professional and Office Web Apps to be installed on SharePoint 2010 technology. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Office Web Apps.

References:

Getting Started with Office Web Apps

Office Web Apps (SharePoint 2010)

Microsoft Office Web Apps - Deployment

19. PerformancePoint Service

Enables PerformancePoint functionality to create rich, interactive, visual, and context-driven dashboards and scorecards as part of a comprehensive business intelligence solution. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, PerformancePoint Services Site Collection Features and PerformancePoint Services Site Features.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

Note: Before configuring this service, make sure the Secure Store Service has been started, and then configure the unattended service account.

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click PerformancePoint Service Application.

References:

PerformancePoint Services overview (SharePoint Server 2010)

Plan for PerformancePoint Services (SharePoint Server 2010)

PerformancePoint Services administration (SharePoint Server 2010)

Manage PerformancePoint Services site and site collections (SharePoint Server 2010)

20. PowerPivot Service

Used to manage the PowerPivot application database, balance loads, collect data and perform automatic data refresh. SQL PowerPivot is an add-in to Office Excel 2010 and is used to combine and analyze extremely large amounts of data almost instantly. Requires PowerPivot Excel Add-in reports in SharePoint to be installed.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click PowerPivot Service Application.

References:

PowerPivot Overview

Overview of PowerPivot documentation (SharePoint Server 2010)

Plan a PowerPivot Deployment (SQLS) (SharePoint Server 2010)

21. PowerPoint Service (Office Web Applications)

Used to prepare Office PowerPoint presentations for viewing and editing in a Web browser. See also the SharePoint service, Office Web Apps Services. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Office Web Apps.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click PowerPoint Service Application.

References:

Configure PowerPoint service application settings

22. Project Application Service

Hosts one or more Microsoft Project Web Access instances, exposes scheduling functionality and other middle-tier calculations on Microsoft Project data, and exposes Web services for interacting with Microsoft Project 2010 data. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, Project Server Approval Content Type, Project Web App Ribbon, Sample Proposal, Project Proposal Workflow, and Project Sites Collaboration Lists.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Project Server Service Application.

References:

Create a PWA site (Project Server 2010)

23. Report Service

Manages service communication, accounts, report management, and database access. This SharePoint Service has the related SharePoint Feature, Report Server Integration Feature.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click General Application Settings.

c. On the General Application Settings page, under Reporting Services, click Add a Report Server to the Integration.

d. Use the Service configuration page to view or modify the default server settings for Reporting Services.

References:

Reporting Services with SharePoint Integration (SQL 2008 R2)

24. Search Query and Site Settings Service

Crawls content, produces index partitions, handles site settings, processes search queries, and runs the query processor. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, SharePoint Server Site Search, SharePoint Server Enterprise Search, and Search Server Web Parts.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Search Service Application.

References:

Getting Started with SharePoint Server 2010

SharePoint Server 2010 Search Help and How-to

25. Secure Store Service

Provides single sign-on (SSO) authentication to access multiple applications or services.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Secure Store Service.

References:

Configure the Secure Store Service (SharePoint Server 2010)

Plan the Secure Store Service (SharePoint Server 2010)

26. SharePoint Foundation Search

Enable the Help search functionality in SharePoint Foundation 2010.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

d. In the list of services, click SharePoint Foundation Help Search.

27. SharePoint Server Search

Hosts the query process for the full text index and the indexer process for SharePoint Server 2010 search capabilities. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, SharePoint Server Site Search, SharePoint Server Enterprise Search, and Search Server Web Parts.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

d. In the list of services, click SharePoint Server Search.

References:

Getting Started with SharePoint 2010 Search

28. State Service

Provides temporary storage of user session data for SharePoint Server components.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

Note This service is not configurable.

Reference:

Manage the State Service (SharePoint Server 2010)

29. Usage and Health Data Collection

Collects farm wide usage and health data and provides the ability to view various usage and health reports. This service is works with SharePoint Health

Analyzer, which uses an extensible, rules-based engine to monitor farm health, automatically fix common configuration and performance issues, automate analysis with the SharePoint Best Practices Analyzer, and help administrators find other issues across all servers through a “Problems and solutions page” in Central Administration. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Advanced Web Analytics.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Usage and Health data collection.

References:

Health monitoring (SharePoint Server 2010)

Health monitoring (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

SharePoint Health Analyzer has detected an error or warning (SharePoint 2010 Products)

30. User Profile Service

Adds support for My Sites, Profile pages, social tagging and other social computing features. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, SharePoint Server Standard Site Collection Features, SharePoint Server Standard Web Application Features, SharePoint Server Standard Site Features, and Social Tags and Note Board Ribbon Controls.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click User Profile Service Application.

References:

Plan for social computing and collaboration (SharePoint Server 2010)

My Sites and Social Tagging

User Profile Service administration (SharePoint Server 2010)

My Site Web sites overview (SharePoint Server 2010)

31. User Profile Synchronization Service

Stores social information about users in a central location and enables many social computing features, such as My Sites, social tagging, and newsfeeds. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, SharePoint Server Standard Site Collection Features, SharePoint Server Standard Web Application Features, SharePoint Server Standard Site Features, and Social Tags and Note Board Ribbon Controls.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note This service is not configurable.

Reference:

User Profile Service administration (SharePoint Server 2010)

32. Visio Graphics Service

Enables the publishing and viewing of static or refreshable, data-linked Visio Web Drawings rendered in a browser using Microsoft Silverlight or PNG format, as well as Visio workflow visualization. Requires Microsoft Visio 2010 Professional and Premium editions to create and publish diagrams. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Features, Visio Process Repository and Visio Web Access.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Visio Graphics Service.

References:

Visio Services

Visio Services overview (SharePoint Server 2010)

Plan for Visio Services (SharePoint Server 2010)

Visio Graphics Service administration (SharePoint Server 2010)

33. Web Analytics Data Processing Service

Provides the web service interfaces for Web Analytics. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Advanced Web Analytics.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note: This service is not configurable.

34. Web Analytics Web Service

Provides rich insights into your web traffic, search, and assets to better understand your users and deployments, and to tailor and optimize your sites. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Advanced Web Analytics.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

Note: This service is not configurable.

35. Word Automation Services

Enables automated bulk document conversions through a scalable engine that delivers save, export, and print capabilities for Word Documents. When combined with the Office Open XML SDK, Word Automation Services supports document creation, manipulation and renditions as well as integration with line of business systems for generating content based on structured data sources.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Word Automation Services

Reference:

Getting Started with Word Automation Services

36. Word Viewing Service (Office Web Applications)

Used to prepare Office Word documents for viewing and editing in a Web browser. See also the SharePoint service, Office Web Apps Services. This SharePoint service has the related SharePoint Feature, Office Web Apps.

To start or stop this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click System Settings.

c. On the System Settings page, under Services, click Manage services on server.

To configure this service:

a. Navigate to Central Administration for the farm.

b. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

c. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

d. In the list of services, click Word Viewing Service.

Thanks to Mark Gillis, most of the information provided above refers to his white paper titled "Understanding and troubleshooting SharePoint 2010 technology Features and services"

Command createssp failed for SSP..Unable to connect to database

2010-10-18T18:30:00.003+05:30

I received this error while creating the SSP for a MOSS 2007 SP1 farm:

Command createssp failed for SSP 'SharedServices2' Microsoft.SharePoint.SPException: Unable to connect to database. Check database connection information and make sure the database server is running. ---> System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException (0x81020024): Unable to connect to database. Check database connection information and make sure the database server is running

I tried both from GUI of Central Admin and also createssp command of stsadm, both failed with the same error. I checked the ULS logs and found the above error. In event viewer I could see the event id 6141:

Event Type: Error

Event Source: Windows SharePoint Services 3

Event Category: Topology

Event ID: 6141

Description:
The site /ssp/admin could not be created. The following exception occured: Unable to connect to database. Check database connection information and make sure the database server is running.

No matter what I tried SSP was not provisioning. After hours of researching on the Internet I found that restarting search service and reconfiguring SSP might solve this problem. I thought of starting from the scratch. The following steps solved this problem and SSP was provisioned successfully:

1. Delete the SSP web application
2. Stop the search query & index services
3. Start the search query & index services
4. Restart IIS in Application server (I was trying to create SSP from my App server)
5. Recreate the SSP web application on a different port
6. Recreate the SSP from Central Admin - Create or configure this farm's shared services

MOSS 2007 versions

2010-10-15T11:25:00.002+05:30

Here is a list of MOSS patches, corresponding versions, and release month and year:

Office SharePoint Server 2007 : 12.0.4518.1016

October public update (2007) : 12.0.6036.5000

Service Pack 1 : 12.0.6219.1000

Post Service Pack 1 rollup : 12.0.6300.5000

Infrastructure Update (IU) : 12.0.6320.5000 (July 2008)

August Cumulative Update : 12.0.6327.5000

October Cumulative Update : 12.0.6331.5000 (October 2008)

December Cumulative Update : 12.0.6335.5000 (December 2008)

February Cumulative Update : 12.0.6341.5002 (February 2009)

Service Pack 2 : 12.0.6420.1000 (April 2009)

April Cumulative Update : 12.0.6504.5000 (April 2009)

June Cumulative Update : 12.0.6507.5000 (July 2009)

August Cumulative Update : 12.0.6514.5002 (September 2009)

October Cumulative Update : 12.0.6520.5000 (October 2009)

December Cumulative Update : 12.0.6524.5001 (December 2009)

February Cumulative Update : 12.0.6529.5000 (February 2010)

April Cumulative Update : 12.0.6535.5000 (April 2010)

June Cumulative Update : 12.0.6539.5000 (June 2010)

August Cumulative Update : 12.0.6545.5001 (August 2010)

For updated information, please refer:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/office/sharepointserver/bb735839.aspx

Here is the recommended installation sequence of updates:

1. Latest available Service Pack for WSS 3.0
2. Latest available Service Pack for MOSS 2007
3. Latest available CU (Cumulative Update) for WSS 3.0
4. Latest available CU (Cumulative Update) for MOSS 2007

In a farm the updates can be applied on the SharePoint servers in the above sequence and PS Config wizard needs to be run on every SharePoint server in the farm.

More information on deploying software updates for SharePoint Server 2007 may be found here:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263467%28office.12%29.aspx

http error 401.1 unauthorized access is denied due to invalid credentials

2010-10-14T17:27:00.002+05:30

I got this error while trying to browse my SharePoint site from within the server. I tried in both my front ends and application server and got the same error. I double checked to make sure the user I'm trying to login to the site had enough permission and also that password had not expired or account locked. Nothing seems to help.

Then I came across this excellent article by Spencer Harbar which talks about this issue. This error is caused by a feature in Windows Server 2003 SP1 and above called loopback security check. This feature prevents access to a site using its FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) from the server that hosts the website. Here is Spencer's blog post:
http://www.harbar.net/archive/2009/07/02/disableloopbackcheck-amp-sharepoint-what-every-admin-and-developer-should-know.aspx

There is also a Microsoft KB article that gives a solution to this problem. There are two solutions, disable loop check through a registry entry (not recommended for production servers) or add a list of addresses to exclude from the check.

Method 1: Disable the loopback check (less-recommended method)
The second method is to disable the loopback check by setting the DisableLoopbackCheck registry key.

To set the DisableLoopbackCheck registry key, follow these steps:

1. Set the DisableStrictNameChecking registry entry to 1. For more information about how to do this, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
281308 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/281308/ ) Connecting to SMB share on a Windows 2000-based computer or a Windows Server 2003-based computer may not work with an alias name
2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. In Registry Editor, locate and then click the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa
4. Right-click Lsa, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
5. Type DisableLoopbackCheck, and then press ENTER.
6. Right-click DisableLoopbackCheck, and then click Modify.
7. In the Value data box, type 1, and then click OK.
8. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart your computer.

Method 2: Specify host names (Preferred method if NTLM authentication is desired)
To specify the host names that are mapped to the loopback address and can connect to Web sites on your computer, follow these steps:

1. Set the DisableStrictNameChecking registry entry to 1. For more information about how to do this, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
281308 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/281308/ ) Connecting to SMB share on a Windows 2000-based computer or a Windows Server 2003-based computer may not work with an alias name
2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. In Registry Editor, locate and then click the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa\MSV1_0
4. Right-click MSV1_0, point to New, and then click Multi-String Value.
5. Type BackConnectionHostNames, and then press ENTER.
6. Right-click BackConnectionHostNames, and then click Modify.
7. In the Value data box, type the host name or the host names for the sites that are on the local computer, and then click OK.
8. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart the IISAdmin service.

Restore SQL Server database from multiple backup files

2010-10-11T09:37:00.002+05:30

To restore a SQL server database from multiple files we can use the RESTORE DATABASE T-SQL command.

Before we do the restore process it is good to know the name of the “.mdf” and “.ldf” files in the backup set. To find this out we can run the RESTORE FILELISTONLY command in the following syntax:

RESTORE FILELISTONLY FROM

DISK = 'E:\Db_Backups\FILE1_FULL.BAK',

DISK = 'E:\Db_Backups\FILE2_FULL.BAK',

DISK = 'E:\Db_Backups\FILE3_FULL.BAK'

In the above example I assume the full backup consists of 3 files, “FILE1_FULL.BAK”, “FILE2_FULL.BAK”, and “FILE3_FULL.BAK”. The files in this case files are locate in E drive “Db_Backups” folder.

The above command will output the name of the “.mdf” and “.ldf” files contained in the backup set. Once we get those we can run the actual restore command in the following way:

RESTORE DATABASE My_DB FROM

DISK = 'E:\Db_Backups\FILE1_FULL.BAK',

DISK = 'E:\Db_Backups\FILE2_FULL.BAK',

DISK = 'E:\Db_Backups\FILE3_FULL.BAK'

WITH

MOVE My_DB ' TO 'E:\DATA\ My_DB.mdf',

MOVE My_DB _log' TO 'E:\LOGS\ My_DB _log.LDF',

STATS =1

Using the Move command we move the restored data and log files to a location of our choice and with STATS set as 1 we get a detailed verbose of the tasks happening similar to this:

1 percent processed.

2 percent processed.

3 percent processed.

…

100 percent processed.

Processed 108352 pages for database My_DB ', file My_DB ' on file 1.

Processed 5 pages for database ' My_DB ', file ' My_DB _log' on file 1.

RESTORE DATABASE successfully processed 108357 pages in 11.006 seconds (80.652 MB/sec).

When the database we try to restore does not exist and when the backup set is not a full backup, we receive the following error:

Msg 3118, Level 16, State 1, Line 1

The database " My_DB " does not exist. RESTORE can only create a database when restoring either a full backup or a file backup of the primary file.

Msg 3013, Level 16, State 1, Line 1

RESTORE DATABASE is terminating abnormally.

In this case we have to make sure we are using a Full backup to restore.

Login failed for user NT AUTHORITY\ANONYMOUS LOGON

2010-10-06T18:45:00.002+05:30

I saw that this error was appearing multiple times on my SharePoint front end server:

Event Type: ErrorEvent
Source: Windows SharePoint Services 3
Event Category: Database
Event ID: 3351
Date: 9/28/2010
Time: 12:06:00 PM
User: N/A
Computer: WFE2
Description:SQL database login failed. Additional error information from SQL Server is included below.
Login failed for user 'NT AUTHORITY\ANONYMOUS LOGON'.
For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp

I did some research and it turned out the error occurs because "Windows SharePoint Services VSS Writer" service in that SharePoint box was running "Local System". I changed this to a domain service account and the error vanished.

Replace Index Server in MOSS Farm

2010-09-19T13:37:00.003+05:30

We had an issue with our Index server running out of disk space. The server was old and didn't have slots available to add more storage.

The approach I took had a disadvantage that I had to do a Full Crawl again. Here are the steps I followed:

1. Setup MOSS server with all pre-requisites; do not add server to farm

Note: It is important not to install .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 on this server, please read my previous blog post for more details. It can be installed after setting up search.

2. Reset all crawled content from Central Admin. We may choose to remove the existing Index server from farm if required

3. Run PS Config wizard on new Index server and add the server to farm. If you have done a complete installation of MOSS the Web Application service and Incoming Email service would have started. Before configuring search we may choose to stop these services.

3. Start search service from Services on Server page of Central Admin - Operations and do the configuration.

4. Navigate to SSP and associate this new Index server there. This is done from Application Management - Create of Configure this farms Shared Services

5. Navigate to SSP Admin page and click on Search Settings to configure search scopes and start crawl.

Authentication failed because the remote party has closed the transport stream

2010-09-18T17:41:00.010+05:30

While trying to configure Search Settings in my new Index Server, I received this error when I clicked "Search Settings" from SSP:

In my farm I was planning to run both Index and Query services on same server. I did some research and found that this could be because of corrupted SSL for the Office Web service. The reason it seems to be .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 !! Yes it seems if we enable search service or configure Index server on a box which has .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 the SSL of the Office web service in IIS would go corrupted.

I had a similar situation; I was replacing the Index server in my MOSS farm version 12.0.0.6219 I brought up this new server with same OS and framework patch level as the existing index server. That was a mistake because my existing Index server was setup in 2008 and that time there was no .NET Framework 3.5 that time. It got installed later during a patching window. But in my case when I made the patch level same on my new server I installed all framework on it, 2.0, 3.0, 3.5, and 3.5 SP1. So on top of that I configured MOSS and setup search service.

I found an article by Brendan Griffin where he discusses about a similar issue:

http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/Blogs/fromthefield/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=64

He was suggesting to reinstall the SSL but I was confused about doing that since this is a production environment. What finally worked for me were these:

1. Remove the server from farm by running PSConfig wizard.

2. Uninstall .NET framework in the order 3.5 SP1, 3.0, and then 2.0.

3. Install .NET framework 2.0, 3.0 and 3.5 - I did not install framework 3.5 SP1

4. Ran PSConfig wizard again the added the server to the farm, configured search, added the new Index server to SSP.

Now there was no issues. The root cause was that I had .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 installed before configuring server as Index server.

Hope this helps someone who face this situation!

"Cannot impersonate user for data source" - SSRS reports

2010-08-19T13:29:00.004+05:30

We were getting this strange error while viewing our reports in SharePoint that was deployed using BIDS 2005:

An error has occurred during report processing. Cannot impersonate user for data source 'datasource' Logon failed

I tried many things but nothing worked. I did some research and found many blog posts which suggested me to reapply the password on the datasource file specified in the error message and save it again. That didn't work for me.

I saw some check boxes in the data source file that read "Use as Windows Credentials" and "Set Execution Context to this report" and I didn't know what they meant.

I unchecked those in my data source and then when the refreshed the page the report started displaying.

Exception from HRESULT: 0x80041050

2010-08-16T17:59:00.003+05:30

We were receiving this error on the home page of root site collection of our SharePoint test farm and also on some inner site collections.

Server Error in '/' Application.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Exception from HRESULT: 0x80041050

Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code.

Exception Details: System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException: Exception from HRESULT: 0x80041050

I had no clues as to why this happens because googling returned many results and confused me more. It turned out that the issue was related to Forefront for SharePoint. I had installed ForeFront for SharePoint evaluation and that had scanned and marked some pages as virus. I couldn't get Forefront to work properly and uninstalled it. May be this caused some jobs to get stuck or something; I'm not sure why ForeFront marks SharePoint masterpages as virus.

If ForeFront is still installed, we'll have to remove these pages from scanned results. Navigate to Forefront Admin console:

1.Please disable scanning on a correctly flagged pages as a virus in Forefront.

2.Open Forefront Admin console.

3.Go to filtering.

4.Click on File.

5.Add a new item as *.aspx select “Detect only”

6.Make the filter enable and click save.

7.Remove your pages from the pages library located at”View all Site Content”->Pages.

8.Add your Custom.aspx pages back into the pages library

I had already uninstalled Forefront, so I had to do this the hard way :) editing from backend:

1. Ran the sql command “select * from AllDocs where (VirusStatus>0) and (VirusStatus IS NOT NULL)”

2. It returned results. I backuped the database and performed “Update AllDocs set VirusStatus= null where (VirusStatus>0) and (VirusStatus IS NOT NULL)” on this database

3. I repeated these steps on all content databases

Note: If you update SharePoint tables using SQL query, the support might become void. I did this since this was our testing environment.

Object reference not set to an instance of an object "FormTemplate.SolutionDeploymentFailed"

2010-07-29T22:46:00.003+05:30

I got this error in my Manage forms template page in Central Admin:

Object reference not set to an instance of an object. at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.Administration.FormTemplate.SolutionDeploymentFailed()

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.Administration.FormTemplate.get_FormTemplateStatus()

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.FormTemplatePropertiesPage.GetStatusString(FormTemplate template)

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.ManageFormTemplatesPage.AddTemplateToTable(FormTemplate template, DataTable table, SPWeb web)

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.ManageFormTemplatesPage.FillDataTable(DataTable table)

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.GridViewPageBase.GridViewDataSourceView.FillDataTable(DataTable table, DataSourceSelectArguments selectArguments)

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.GridViewPageBase.GridViewDataSourceView.Select(DataSourceSelectArguments selectArguments)

at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.AdministrationDataSourceView.ExecuteSelect(DataSourceSelectArguments arguments)

at System.Web.UI.DataSourceView.Select(DataSourceSelectArguments arguments, DataSourceViewSelectCallback callback)

at System.Web.UI.WebControls.DataBoundControl.PerformSelect()

at System.Web.UI.WebControls.BaseDataBoundControl.DataBind()

at System.Web.UI.WebControls.GridView.DataBind()

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.GridViewPageBase.RefreshDataGrid()

at Microsoft.Office.InfoPath.Server.ApplicationPages.ManageFormTemplatesPage.OnPreRender(EventArgs e)

at System.Web.UI.Control.PreRenderRecursiveInternal()

at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint)

Here is what solve this error:

Step 1: Ran stsadm -o enumformtemplates > c:\formlist.txt to output all the InfoPath form templates uploaded in SharePoint Central Administration

Step 2: Due to the fact that I didn’t know which of the form templates is generating the issue I had to delete them all, one by one, by executing the following command:

a. stsadm -o removeformtemplate -formid (eg: urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:infopath:T02-DM-V4-FINAL:-myXSD-2008-07-11T19-40-02)

b. I got the following error while trying to remove some form templates: "this form template was deployed as part of the FT-01-65a1d9ae-868d-f975-ddce-cacf6e4d703d feature. This form template should be removed only by uninstalling that feature."

c. To solve this error then I removed the solution also. So I had to execute: stsadm -o uninstallfeature -id -force (e.g.: stsadm -o uninstallfeature -id f97dd99b-7ea7-1c56-25e5-eddf7ff6099 -force)

In order to determine the id, I navigated to the C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\FT-01-f97dd99b-7ea7-1c56-25e5-eddf7ff6099b and locate the feature.xml file. The id will be located inside of this file.

Here we should find something like Feature Id="50d541c7-d5f4-fa2c-8449-7f3e4e6eaebe" so this is the id we need to use for the stsadm command

After I removed one InfoPath form I performed an iisreset and try to open the Manage InfoPath forms page. This way I did refresh the page after removing each form and after removing one particular form the Manage Forms page came up without any error. The form I removed last before the page came up without any error was deployed 2 years back. From this I have to conclude that there was some issue with this forms deployment or some timer job that was supposed to activate or deploy this form was stuck.

Hope this save time for someone!

An unhandled exception occurred in the user interface.Exception Information: The server committed a protocol violation. Section=ResponseStatusLine

2010-05-12T09:47:00.005+05:30

I was trying to start the Office SharePoint Search Service from Central Admin on our new MOSS farm and I received this error the moment I clicked on Start:

An unhandled exception occurred in the user interface.Exception Information: The server committed a protocol violation. Section=ResponseStatusLine

I had no clue what was going wrong because there were not much information in the Event log or ULS logs. After doing some research with the logs, I found these errors in the SharePoint logs:

Exception caught in Search Admin web-service proxy (client). System.Net.WebException: The server committed a protocol violation. Section=ResponseStatusLine at System.Web.Services.Protocols.WebClientProtocol.GetWebResponse(WebRequest request) at System.Web.Services.Protocols.HttpWebClientProtocol.GetWebResponse(WebRequest request) at System.Web.Services.Protocols.SoapHttpClientProtocol.Invoke(String methodName, Object[] parameters) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchWebServiceProxy.RunWithSoapExceptionHandling[T](String methodName, Object[] parameters)

And

Exception Unhandled page level exception. Path: /_admin/SearchServiceInstanceSettings.aspx, Error: The server committed a protocol violation. Section=ResponseStatusLine, Details: System.Net.WebException: The server committed a protocol violation. Section=ResponseStatusLine at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchApi.RunOnServer[T](CodeToRun`1 remoteCode, CodeToRun`1 localCode, Boolean useCurrentSecurityContext, Int32 versionIn) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchApi.RunOnServer[T](CodeToRun`1 remoteCode, CodeToRun`1 localCode) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Internal.UI.SearchServiceInstanceSettings.Page_Init(Object sender, EventArgs e) at System.Web.Util.CalliHelper.EventArgFunctionCaller(IntPtr fp, Object o, Object t, EventArgs e) at System..

After spending almost 3 hours troubleshooting I solved this error by providing Proxy Autodetect = false in web.config of the SSP web application!

You cannot configure surface area of clusted services by connecting to a computer name

2010-04-14T12:50:00.003+05:30

While checking the Surface Area settings in our SQL Server 2005 cluster environment, I received this error:
You cannot configure surface area of clusted services by connecting to a computer name. connect to the virtual server to configure clustered services

The reason was I had logged in remotely using the cluster name and tried to open the SQL Surface Area Configuration window; therefore it was assuming local settings. This is how I fixed the issue:

In SQL Surface Area Configuration Windows, click Change Computer and select the cluster instance under the option Remote Computer

Win 7 created temporary profile

2010-04-07T11:27:00.003+05:30

I got Win 7 installed the other day and suddenly I had log in issues one fine day. When I log in it would take my profile, but log me in to a temp profile.

After searching for sometime in Google I read in a blog that profile could be corrupt. I had to follow these steps to clear the profile:

1.Reboot your Windows 7 machine and log on as different user. Make sure the different user account is a administrator (added to the Administrators group). Or you could log on in to safe mode if you don't know how to.

2.Open Explorer and open C:\Users. Delete the directory of “problematic” user profile and “Temp” directory.

3.Run the Windows Vista registry editor by type regedit in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER.

4.Locate and then expand the following registry subkey:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList

5.You need to find the correct SID and delete it. To make sure you are deleting the right one, check the key ProfileImagePath which has the profile path.

6.Close the registry editor and reboot the computer.

After I logged in to the system the profile folder was re-created.

The specified web does not contain a reporting metadata list

2010-03-30T14:48:00.003+05:30

While clicking on "Audit Log Reports" under Site Collection Administration, I MOSS threw this error:

The specified web does not contain a reporting metadata list

There was no other information on this error. I activated the Reporting feature using force parameter and it solved the problem. This is the command:

stsadm -o activatefeature -name Reporting -url http://[server]/[sitecollection]/ -force

I do not know what caused this error, this site was not migrated from previous version of SharePoint, this happened in our root site collection.

Regards,
Manoj

Failed to connect to the database server or the database name does not exist

2010-02-04T18:55:00.005+05:30

I was trying to install MOSS 2007 64 bit on a Windows Server 2008 R2 (Virtual Server) and I encountered this error while running Sharepoint Products and Technologies Wizard on my first server in the farm:

Failed to connect to the database server or the database name does not exist. Ensure the database server exists, is a Sql server, and that you have the appropriate permissions to access the database server.

It seems certain ports needs to be open in the Windows Server where SQL Server 2008 was installed, this batch file solved the problem:

@echo ========= SQL Server Ports ===================
@echo Enabling SQLServer default instance port 1433
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 1433 "SQLServer"
@echo Enabling Dedicated Admin Connection port 1434
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 1434 "SQL Admin Connection"
@echo Enabling conventional SQL Server Service Broker port 4022
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 4022 "SQL Service Broker"
@echo Enabling Transact-SQL Debugger/RPC port 135
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 135 "SQL Debugger/RPC"
@echo ========= Analysis Services Ports ==============
@echo Enabling SSAS Default Instance port 2383
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 2383 "Analysis Services"
@echo Enabling SQL Server Browser Service port 2382
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 2382 "SQL Browser"
@echo ========= Misc Applications ==============
@echo Enabling HTTP port 80
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 80 "HTTP"
@echo Enabling SSL port 443
netsh firewall set portopening TCP 443 "SSL"
@echo Enabling port for SQL Server Browser Service's 'Browse' Button
netsh firewall set portopening UDP 1434 "SQL Browser"
@echo Allowing multicast broadcast response on UDP (Browser Service Enumerations OK)
netsh firewall set multicastbroadcastresponse ENABLE

CREATE FILE encountered operating system error 5 (Access is denied)

2010-02-01T11:29:00.005+05:30

I was trying to move some content dbs in our MOSS farm to another drive in the same Server. I stopped all website from IIS and stopped all the related services, then ran stsadm deletecontentdb command with all the required parameters.

Then I detached the db and it threw an error and I just closed it by clicking Ok. Now I went to the drive to copy and paste the .mdf and .ldf file to the new drive. I tried to copy the .mdf file and I got access denied error but the db was already detached, I was screwed! The downtime was only for a couple of hours and I had many dbs to move to this new drive.

I googled for some time and did not get many solutions, some people had encountered this error but none of them posted an answer. I tried to attach the file again from the old location, atleast site will not go down. But when I tried to attach I got this wierd error from SQL Server 2005 Management Studio:

TITLE: Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio
------------------------------

Failed to retrieve data for this request. (Microsoft.SqlServer.SmoEnum)

For help, click: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink?ProdName=Microsoft+SQL+Server&LinkId=20476

------------------------------
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

An exception occurred while executing a Transact-SQL statement or batch. (Microsoft.SqlServer.ConnectionInfo)

------------------------------

CREATE FILE encountered operating system error 5(Access is denied.) while attempting to open or create the physical file 'M:\SQLDataFiles\Kubera_Portal_CU_Sempra.mdf'. (Microsoft SQL Server, Error: 5123)

For help, click: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink?ProdName=Microsoft+SQL+Server&ProdVer=09.00.3042&EvtSrc=MSSQLServer&EvtID=5123&LinkId=20476

The help links provided my Microsoft did not take me anywhere, it did not help!

Now I could not copy the file to new location or attach the file again! Finally somebody wrote in a blog that such files can be copied by taking ownership of the file. I changed the owner and took ownership and then I was able to copy the file to new location. Then there was something else, the .ldf file was missing and I have no clue why that happened. Since there was nothing else to be done, I attached the .mdf file alone and gave a location for the .ldf file and it got attached. Those were some hear pulling moments because I was dealing with a production server!

Service Unavailable in MOSS Central Admin

2010-01-14T15:19:00.003+05:30

Everything was working fine until got this Service Unavailable error from my MOSS central administration. I checked the IIS and app pool, everything seemed fine. I double checked that the domain account that ran my Central Admin app pool had sufficient rights, this was a dev server farm and people could be playing around with it. But this account had sufficient rights.

Then I checked to login remotely to another server in this farm using the same domain account and I got the error that the account was locked! Now that was the problem. I checked with IT and got this account unlocked and Central Admin came back online :)

Gateway time out Error

2010-01-11T17:30:00.009+05:30

I was creating a new web application on a WSS 3.0 server for hosting BPM application webparts. This new site had to be accessible from Internet. While creating the new web application I provided a host header which was already set up in the DNS server and it had an IP address too. Next I created a site collection.

After creating this web application I provided this IP address on the properties tab in ISS for this website. It was created on port 80. I had also provided the IP address in the "Advanced TCP/IP Settings" of this server. Now when I tried to access this new web application, I got the error "Gateway time out".

I had no clue as to what was causing this error. Then a colleague pointed me to a Microsoft fix for this issue: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/896861

After applying this I had to restart the server and now there was another error. It said "File not found". I edited the web.config of this web application so that I get a detailed error. I changed callstack to "true" and customerror to "Off". The issue was related to some dlls for this BPM webparts. I checked the solution management section in Central Administration - Operations and found that wsp for this BPM application was deployed locally for another web app and not globally. Then I deployed this wsp for my new web application and error vanished. Things are sorted out now.

For more information on the Loopback issue Check this blog

WSS Backup failed - Cannot open backup device

2009-12-10T15:33:00.006+05:30

I was trying to backup my WSS 3.0 farm when I encountered this error:

Object SharePoint_Config failed in event OnBackup. For more information, see the error log located in the backup directory. SqlException: Cannot open backup device '\\servername\backup\spbr0001\0000001.bak'. Operating system error 5(Access is denied)

I guessed this would be because of permissions with the backup folder. I had created a shared folder in my server where WSS was installed. I had given Share and security permission "Change/Modify" for the Network Service user. But that did not work. I followed these steps and it solved my issue:

1. Set the SQL Server (MSSQLSERVER) Windows service to run as a domain account and restarted the service and IIS.
2. Granted "change" Share permissions on the backup folder for the user that runs the Central Admin application pool, db SQL account, and WSS Timer service.
3. Granted "Modify" Security permission on the backup folder for the user that runs the Central Admin application pool, db SQL account, and WSS Timer service.
4. Checked if I could access the Shared backup folder

Installing WSS 3.0 on single server

2009-12-10T13:58:00.034+05:30

I installed WSS 3.0 on a server the other day. I googled to find the installer package and found out that there was a SP2 slip-streamed package of WSS 3.0. So I downloaded and installed it on the Windows 2003 Server. These are the screens of installation:

Click Advance

For detailed steps on installation, refer these Technet articles:
Install Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 on a stand-alone computer
Deploy in a simple server farm (Windows SharePoint Services)

Uninstall MOSS 2007

2009-12-10T13:51:00.008+05:30

Recently I had to remove MOSS 2007 Enterprise from a Server. All I did was remove it from Add/Remove Programs from Control Panel of the Server. These are the screen shots:

E Payment project

2009-07-04T19:26:00.000+05:30

Ok, there were lots of hair pulling moments, but I did it finally. I completed my first e payment project, an online shopping application. It was sort of fun and I learned some new things.

The bank that we had created Merchant account with supported only Mastercard Gateway Service and our client did not want to have paypal integration, so my task became difficult. I had never done such an application before, so it was a challenge. I was the only person working on this project.

We had purchased a shopping cart product but it didn't support this payment gateway, it supported every other gateway available except this one. So I was in bit of trouble, I had to integrate this gateway with an application that didn't even had a technical manual. I was the one who recommended this product to the management and now I was stuck with this. I tried to contact their support requesting for a technical manual on their APIs and other classes. But they didn't provide me anything.

So I started to learn their architecture and I went through the code. Fortunately this shopping cart product had a gateway integration manual which gave the basics on creating a new payment gateway. Referring this manual and the payment gateway manual from Mastercard I completed this integration sucessfully.

It was a nice feeling because I could do this alone and now I'm confident that I can handle such projects in future.

Dotnetnuke 4.9.4 on a port in IIS

2009-06-21T14:13:00.001+05:30

So I was trying to install DNn 4.9.4 on our test server on the port 8032. Idea was that I would install it and another guy from our team would work on the skins. Well, installation is supposed to be simple, but I din't know what was in store for me untill I tried!

Ok I started by creating a database and I copied the files from install zip file. Then I created the new website in ISS on port 8032. I changed connection string values in the web.config and the site installed properly. Now I was happy, this was my first DNN installation, wow that felt nice :)

Now I clicked on the "Click here to access your portal" link and duh, nothing. It initially gave me Page not available error, then I refreshed the page a couple of times and it gave me 403 error.
It was almost 9 in the night and I was feeling hungry here. Ok I checked most of the articles that was available out here and did all what the experts suggested, but to no avail.

I found that in the PortalAlias table, it inserted "localhost/install", well that was strange. I removed and made it "localhost:8032", I was so confident it would solve the problem. But unfortunately it didn't.

Hunger took control over my thoughts to solve this issue and I called it a night. But then I thought of a similar issue a colleague had some time back. It was related to some setting called "UsePortNumber". It was commented in the config file. I uncommented and refreshed the page, it works like a charm.

Gosh, how easy it was. Just a small change. Just wanted to share my experience here!