Category Archives: Administration

Behold the new SharePoint Splash screen

With the new version of SharePoint 2013 that was released on MSDN last week as you can read here SharePoint 2013 has a new Installation screen to give power to the new Interface of SharePoint 2013.

SharePoint 2013 Splash

Today I will start a new fresh installation of a development machine with the following specifications:

  • Microsoft Office 2013 Professional.
  • Microsoft Office Visio 2013.
  • Microsoft Office Project 2013.
  • Visual Studio 2012.
  • Windows Server 2012.
  • SQL Server 2012.

Every interesting thing I will discover will be posted on this blog, so stay tuned!

SharePoint 2013 Databases without the GUID

When you configure SharePoint 2013 it will create the SharePoint_AdminContent database with a GUID at the end. To keep my database names clean I searched for a solution.

To be able to set the name of the database you will have to perform the configuration with PowerShell.

Take the following steps:

1. Open SharePoint 2013 Management Shell as Administrator.

2. Type the following:

New-SPConfigurationDatabase -DatabaseName BETA_SP2013_Config –AdministrationContentDatabaseName BETA_SP2013_AdminContent –DatabaseServer SP2013DB -FarmCredentials (get-credential)

3. You will get a pop-up to fill in the farm credentials. Fill in the account you want to use to run central administration under. When you filled in the account the management shell will also ask you to fill in the passphrase for joining servers to your farm.

4. Install the help collection files by running the following script.

Install-SPHelpCollection –All

5. Initialize the SharePoint Security by running the following script.

Initialize-SPResourceSecurity

6. Register the SharePoint Services by running the following script.

Install-SPService

7. Create central administration by running the following script.

New-SPCentralAdministration -Port 5555 -WindowsAuthProvider “ntlm”

8. Install the application content by running the following script.

Install-SPApplicationContent

9. When everything is done. You performed the steps the configuration wizard does for you. To be absolutely sure that everything is configured run the configuration wizard.

 

After these steps SharePoint is configured with a clean database name!

Almost all other SharePoint databases can be named trough the UI only the Search Service Application and the Usage service create there own databases. The solution is to also create these services  with PowerShell.

In other for you to create the Search Service Application you can use the script below (You only have to change the arguments on the top).

$databaseServer = "SP2013DB"
$ServiceAppPool = "SharePoint Services Application Pool"
$IndexLocation = "C:\SP2013_Search"
$SearchServiceApplicationName = "Search Service Application"
$server = "CLAY"

Write-Host "Setting up Search"

Start-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance $server
Start-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryAndSiteSettingsServiceInstance $server

$searchApp = New-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication -Name $SearchServiceApplicationName -ApplicationPool $ServiceAppPool -DatabaseServer $databaseServer -DatabaseName "BETA_SP2013_Search"
$searchInstance = Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance $server

$ssa = Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication 

Write-Host "Setup Topology"
$ssa.ActiveTopology
$clone = $ssa.ActiveTopology.Clone()

New-SPEnterpriseSearchAdminComponent –SearchTopology $clone -SearchServiceInstance $searchInstance
New-SPEnterpriseSearchContentProcessingComponent –SearchTopology $clone -SearchServiceInstance $searchInstance
New-SPEnterpriseSearchAnalyticsProcessingComponent –SearchTopology $clone -SearchServiceInstance $searchInstance 
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlComponent –SearchTopology $clone -SearchServiceInstance $searchInstance 
New-SPEnterpriseSearchIndexComponent –SearchTopology $clone -SearchServiceInstance $searchInstance -RootDirectory $IndexLocation
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryProcessingComponent –SearchTopology $clone -SearchServiceInstance $searchInstance

$clone.Activate()

$ssa | get-SPEnterpriseSearchAdministrationComponent |  set-SPEnterpriseSearchAdministrationComponent -SearchServiceInstance  $searchInstance


Write-Host "Setup Proxy"
$searchAppProxy = New-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplicationProxy -Name "$SearchServiceApplicationName Proxy" -SearchApplication $SearchServiceApplicationName > $null

Write-Host "Done"

 

You need to take the steps below to create the Usage Service Application:

1. Get the Usage Service.

$serviceInstance = Get-SPUsageService

2. Create the service application.

New-SPUsageApplication -Name "Usage Service Application -DatabaseServer SP2013DB -DatabaseName "BETA_SP2013_UsageDB" -UsageService $serviceInstance > $null

3.  Get the proxy off the application and provision it.

$usa = Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy | where {$_.TypeName -like "Usage*"} 
$usa.Provision()

Install SharePoint 2013 Public Beta on Windows Server 2012 RC – Part VI – Configuring SharePoint 2013 on Windows Server 2012 RC

Last week we finished the installation of SharePoint 2013. For us to test the new version off SharePoint we still have to do some configuration.

The first thing we will do is creating a couple of service accounts that we will use to create Service Application and Web Applications.

Open Active Directory Users or Computer by doing the following:

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open select “Active Directory Users and Computers”.

Open the Users OU and use your other mouse button to add a new user. When you have the “New Object – User” window open create the following user.

First name Last name User Logon name User logon name
SharePoint Application Pool svc_spapppool svc_spapppool
SharePoint Services svc_spservices svc_spservices
SharePoint Search svc_spsearch svc_spsearch
SharePoint Content Access spcontentaccess spcontentaccess

 

Make sure you select the options, for all of the accounts:

  • User cannot change password.
  • Password never expires.

For us to create a new site we will also have to register a url within the DNS (You can also do this within your host file).  To alter the DNS configuration do the following:

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open select “DNS”.

Select the forward lookup zone of your domain and add a new A Host record. For this machine I chose the following domain: sp2013.dev.local.

SharePoint-2013---DNS-Entry

For us to access this URL this machine we will also have to disable the LoopBackCheck, this is because Windows Server 2012 also had the same security enabled as Windows Server 2008 R2. To disable the LoopBackCheck check this blog post:

http://msftplayground.com/2009/04/access-denied-while-crawling-sites/

Now that we have done these configurations we can start with the last configuration steps off SharePoint. First off we will create some managed accounts:

Create Managed Accounts

To create managed accounts follow the following steps:

  1. Open “Central Administration”
  2. Go to the Security section.
  3. Select “Configure Managed Accounts”  under “General Security”.
  4. Then add managed accounts for all the accounts we created in the AD besides the spcontentaccess account.

SharePoint-2013---Managed-Accounts

With the managed accounts in place it is time to create our web application.

Create Web Application

To create a new web application follow these steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage web applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New”  within the toolbar.
  4. Create the web application with the following information.
Setting Value
IIS Web Site Create a new IIS web site.
Name: SharePont – SP2013
Port:80
Host Header: sp2013.dev.local
Path: Keep the default value
Security Configuration Allow Anonymous:false
Use Secure Sockets Layer(SSL): false
Claims Authentication Type Integrated Windows Authentication: NTLM
Sign In Page Url Default Sign In Page
Public Url URL: http://sp2013.dev.local:80
Zone: Default
Application Pool Create new application pool:
Name: SharePoint Web Application
Configurable: DEV\sp_spapppool
Database Name and Authentication Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: WSS_Content_2013
Windows Authentication
Service Application Connections Default

 

Press ‘Ok’ to create the web application.

SharePoint-2013---New-Web-Applciation---Waiting

When the web application is created we will define some managed paths to create site collections.

Define Managed Paths

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage web applications”.
  3. Select the web application for which you want to define the managed paths.
  4. On the toolbar select “Managed Paths” within the toolbar.
  5. In the Define Managed Paths window add the following Managed Paths:
Path Type
personal Explicit
hub Explicit
content Explicit

 

With the Managed Paths in place it is time to create a few site collections.

Create Site Collections

First off we will create a MySite host site collection. To start creating site collections follow these steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Create Site Collections”
  3. Make the site collection with the following information:
Setting Value
Web Application Make sure the right web application is selected
Title and Description Title: SP2013 MySite
Description: MySite Host
Web Site Address Url: http://sp2013.dev.local/personal
Template Selection Enterprise – My Site Host
Site Collection Administrators Choose the users you want to administrator the site collection. For this machine we will use dev\spadmin

 

Creating a site collection with these settings will create a my site host. We will also create a Team site and a Hub site.

Settings for the Hub site

Setting Value
Web Application Make sure the right web application is selected
Title and Description Title: SP2013 Hub
Description: Hub Host
Web Site Address Url: http://sp2013.dev.local/hub
Template Selection Enterprise – My Site Host
Site Collection Administrators Choose the users you want to administrator the site collection. For this machine we will use dev\spadmin

 

Settings for the Team site

Setting Value
Web Application Make sure the right web application is selected
Title and Description Title: SP2013
Description: Team site
Web Site Address Url: http://sp2013.dev.local/
Template Selection Enterprise – My Site Host
Site Collection Administrators Choose the users you want to administrator the site collection. For this machine we will use dev\spadmin

 

With the site collections in place we can start creating the several Service Applications.

Create User Profile Service  Application

To create a User Profile Service Application follow the following steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New”  and select “User Profile Service Application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name User Profile Service Application
Application Pool Create new application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool
Configurable: DEV\svc_spservices
Synchronization Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: Sync_DB
Profile Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: Profile_DB
Social Tagging Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: Social_DB
Profile Synchronization Instance DEV_BETA
My Site Host Url http://sp2013.dev.local/personal
My Site Managed Paths /content
Site Naming Format User name

 

Create Managed Metadata service Application

The following service application we will be creating is the Managed Metadata Service Application.

Follow these steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “Managed Metadata service application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name Managed Metadata Service
Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: SharePoint_Managed_Metadata
Application Pool Use existing application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool
Content Type Hub http://sp2013.dev.local/hub
Select, Report Syndication import errors from site collections using this service application.

 

Create App Management Service Application

Next up is a new service application called “App Management Service Application”. This service application will give you the ability to manage the new App solutions that are build into SharePoint 2013.

Follow these steps to create this service application:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “App Management Service”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name App Management Service Application
Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: App_Managed_DB
Application Pool Use existing application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool
Create App Management Service Application Proxy Select, create App Management Service Application Proxy and add it to the default proxy group.

 

Create Business Data Connectivity Service Application

A service application that was also in SharePoint 2010 is the BDC Application.

Follow these steps to create it:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “Business Data Connectivity Service Application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name Business Data Connectivity Service Application
Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: BDC_Service_DB
Application Pool Use existing application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool

 

When I was creating this service application I received multiple errors. Even when I retried to create at went wrong with the same errors. When I checked the application everything looked fine and seem to be working correctly.

Create Machine Translation Service Application

Another new Service Application is the Machine Translation Service Application. This application give you the option to translate all kind off documents. The texts that are in the documents will be translated by the online Bing translation services.

To create this application use the following steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “Machine Translation Service Application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name Machine Translation Service Application
Application Pool Use existing application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool
Partition mode Don’t select this option.
Add to default proxy list Select this option to add it to the default proxy list.
Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: Machine_Translation_Service_DB

 

Create Search Service Application

The Search Service Application is the next service application we will create. There changed a couple off small things to the search service application but creating is still the same.

Follow these steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “Search Service Application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name Search Service Application
Search Service Account DEV\svc_spsearch
Application Pool for Search Admin Web Service Create New Application Pool.
Application pool name:
SharePoint – Admin Search Service.
Configurable: DEV\svc_spsearch
Application Pool for Search Query & Site Settings Web Service Create New Application Pool.
Application pool name:
SharePoint – Query and Site Settings Pool.
Configurable: DEV\svc_spsearch

 

Create Secure Store Service

We will also create a Secure Store Service for when we would like to test connections to other systems like CRM.

Follow these steps to create the application:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “Secure Store Service Application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name Secure Store Service Application
Database Database Server: SQL2012_SP
Database Name: Secure_Store_Service_DB
Application Pool Use existing application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool
Enable audit Enable the audit log and set the days until purge to 30.

 

Create Work Management Service

The work management service is the last service application we will create trough the UI. This is also one off the new service applications. The work management service application will give users the ability to edit and change there tasks on one single place within the SharePoint farm. This service will take care of changing values on other places and aggregating the tasks. One off the great things it is also possible to synchronize exchange tasks!!!

To create the Work Management Service follow these steps:

  1. With “Central Administration” opened go to the “Application Management” section.
  2. Select “Manage Service Applications”.
  3. On the toolbar select “New” and select “Work management Service Application”
  4. Create the Application with the following settings.
Setting Value
Name Work Management Service Application
Application Pool Use existing application pool:
Application pool name:
SharePoint Service Application Pool
Service Application Proxy Select create proxy for this service application.

 

This were all off the service application we will create trough the UI will will have to create the State Service Application with PowerShell.

Create State Service application with PowerShell

  1. Run the “SharePoint 2013 Management Shell” as Administrator.
  2. Type: “New-SPStateServiceApplication”
  3. Next enter the name for the service application “Name : State Service Application”

With all the Service applications in place we will perform a IISReset make sure that all settings are refreshed.

After the IISReset we can start the service by going to the following screen:

  1. Open “Central Administration”
  2. Select “Application Management”
  3. Then select “Manage services on server”

With the Services screen open start the following services:

  • App Management Service
  • Business Data Connectivity Service
  • Claims to Windows Token Service
  • Machine Translation Service
  • Managed Metadata Web Service
  • Request Management
  • Secure Store Service
  • User Profile Service
  • Work Management Service

When these services are started we will make the farm account (svc_spfarm) local administrator. This is because off the same problem with SharePoint 2010.

To make the svc_spfarm account local administrator do the following:

Open Active Directory Users or Computer by doing the following:

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open select “Active Directory Users and Computers”.
  3. With Active Directory Users and Computers open open the domain and select the Builtin OU.
  4. Within the Builtin OU find the administrators group and add the farm account to it.

Perform a reset off your VM to reset the security of the farm account. Then go back the “Manage services on server” and start the “User Profile Synchronization Service”.

When you will start this service you will have to connect it to a Service Application. Connect it to the User Profile Service application we created above.

With all these service applications and web applications in place you have a great environment to start testing SharePoint 2013. If you have any further question just leave a comment and I will get back to you!!

SharePoint-2013---SP2013-Site-Colleciton

Install SharePoint 2013 Public Beta on Windows Server 2012 RC – Part V – Installation of SharePoint 2013 on Windows Server 2012 RC

Now that the prerequisites are done it is time to start the installation of SharePoint 2013. First off we will have to some configuration changes.

The first thing we will do is creating a farm account to run Central Administration and the farm services.

Open Active Directory Users or Computer by doing the following:

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open select “Active Directory Users and Computers”.

Open the Users OU and use your other mouse button to add a new user. When you have the “New Object – User” window open create the following user.

First name Last name User Logon name User logon name
SharePoint Farm svc_spfarm svc_spfarm

Make sure you select the options:

  • User cannot change password.
  • Password never expires.

Next up is the configuration of a SQL Alias. We will create a SQL alias to be able to migrate the SQL Databases to another Virtual machine if we want.

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open use your other mouse button and select “All apps”.
  3. Open “Command Prompt” and type in cliconfg.
  4. Within SQL Server Client Network Utility go to the Alias tab and click add.
  5. Type in a Alias Name (SQL2012_SP) and fill in the server name of the server that host SQL in our case it will be the local machine.
  6. Also select the following Network library type : TCP/IP.
  7. Select “Ok”  to add the alias and select “Apply” and “Ok” to close the configuration wizard.

SharePoint-2013---Alias-Configuration

With these configuration steps done it is time to mount the image and start the setup of SharePoint 2013.

During the first step of the installation you will have to insert you product key. I received my product key to mail. Fill it in and press “Continue”.

SharePoint-2013---Product-key

Accept the license terms and select “Continue”  again.

SharePoint-2013---License-Terms

The next screen will give you the option to change the file location. For this machine we will leave it to default and start the installation.

SharePoint-2013---File-location   SharePoint-2013---Installation

When the installation is finished the “Run the Configuration Wizard” screen will open. Leave the check box checked and click “Close”.

SharePoint-2013---Run-Configuration-Wizard

The configuration wizard will be opened. On the welcome screen click “Next”.

SharePoint-2013---Configuration-Wizard   SharePoint-2013---Welcome-Warning

When you click next the same warning screen will appear as it did with SharePoint 2010 since this is a new installation we can ignore this message and click “Ok”. The next step gives you the option to connect to an existing farm or to create a new server farm. Since this is a new installation we will select “create a new server farm”.

SharePoint-2013---Configuration-Option

In the next step we will to specify the SharePoint SQL server and the name for the configuration database. We also need to specify the Database access account.

Fill in the following information:

Database server: SQL2012_SP (This is the alias we created)

Database name: SharePoint_Config

Username: dev\svc_spfarm

Password: *********

SharePoint-2013---Database-Settings

On the next step we need to specify the passphrase we want to use when we want to add another server to the farm. Use a a known password that you will remember and click next.

SharePoint-2013---Passphrase

The next step in the wizard will allow you to configure Central Administration. Use a port number u find handy and select NTLM authentication for this demo machine.

SharePoint-2013---Central-Administration  SharePoint-2013---Summary

A summery of the configuration will follow. Check all of the settings and click on “Next” to start the configuration.

SharePoint-2013---Configuration  SharePoint-2013---Configuration-Succesfull

When the configuration is finished the successful window will be shown. Click finish to close the wizard, automatically a explorer window will be opened that opens Central Administration. With a model dialog asking if you want to help improve SharePoint. Select “Yes, I am willing to participate” and click “Ok”.

When the model dialog is closed you will get the option to start the configuration wizard to configure the farm. Select the option “No, I will configure everything myself”.

SharePoint-2013---Configuration-Wizard-Central-Admin

The Central Administration home screen will be opened.

SharePoint-2013---Central-Admin

In the next post we will start the configuration of the different SharePoint 2013 Services.

Install SharePoint 2013 Public Beta on Windows Server 2012 RC – Part III – Installation of SQL Server 2012 on Windows Server 2012 RC

With the new version of SharePoint almost in Public Beta (I have hopes it will be this month) it is time to show how you can install it on the Release Candidate of Windows Server 2012.

Since the new version of SharePoint isn’t there yet this series of blog post will continue with the Installation of SQL Server 2012 on Windows Serve 2012 RC. After this post the following post will follow:

  • Part IV – Installation of the Prerequisites on Windows Server 2012 RC
  • Part V – Installation of SharePoint 2013 on Windows Server 2012 RC
  • Part VI – Configuring SharePoint 2013 on Windows Server 2012 RC

So let us begin with booting up the Virtual Machine we got this far and add the ISO of SQL Server 2012 to the machine.

When continuing from the previous blog post the “Server Manager” will be opened. Close the Server Manager and open “Active Directory Users and Computers” to create the service accounts we need for the installation of SQL Server:

To open Active Directory Users or Computer do the following:

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open select “Active Directory Users and Computers”.

Open the Users OU and use your other mouse button to add users:

new-users

When you have the “New Object – User” window open create the following users:

First name Last name User Logon name User logon name
SQL DB Engine svc_sqldbengine svc_sqldbengine
SQL Reporting svc_sqlreporting svc_sqlreporting
SQL Agent svc_sqlagent svc_sqlagent

 

Make sure you select the options:

  • User cannot change password.
  • Password never expires.

This will make sure the password of the accounts will not be reset or be disabled.

new-user

When the accounts are created it is time to start the installation of SQL server. Run the Setup wizard that’s on the SQL Server 2012 CD / DVD.

When you run the setup the SQL Server Installation Center will open. Press the Installation option on the left and then select “New SQL Server stand-alone installation or add feature to an existing installation”.

SQL-Installation-Center        SQL-Installation-Center---Installation

The installation setup will start with running a few startup rules. When you have passed all of the rules click Ok to continue with the installation.

Setup-Support-Rule

A new window will open and ask for your product key. If your product key hasn’t been filled in yet fill it in and continue by clicking next. On the next step accept the license terms and click next again.

Pre-Setup-Wizard-step-Product-key

The wizard will now start installing the required files for the installation and will start up another wizard. This wizard will automatically check the conditions of the server.

Setup-Support-Rules

Most of the the the wizard will give two warnings:

  1. Computer domain controller: You can ignore this warning because we will use this pc as a development pc. For production servers never install SQL on a domain controller this is for security reasons.
  2. Windows Firewall: This warning states that the Firewall is blocking SQL server. Because the machine will be a one machine farm we can ignore this warning. When you are creating a farm with multiple pc’s you will have to open the SQL server port. By default this is: 1433.

Because we can ignore the warnings we will click next and proceed to the next step. The next step will give us the option to select the installation type. You will have three options:

  1. SQL Server Feature Installation: This option will give you the possibility to install specific features of SQL Server.
  2. SQL Server PowerPivot for SharePoint: This option will give you the possibility to install PowerPivot for SharePoint.
  3. All Features with Defaults.

Setup-Type

We will select the first option: “SQL Server Feature Installation” because we want to install SQL server and select the features we want. We do not want to install everything because this can downgrade the performance of our virtual machine.

In the next step we can select the features we want to install. We will select the following features:

  • Database Engine Services.
    • SQL Server Replication
    • Full-Text and Semantic Extractions for Search
    • Data Quality Services
  • Management Tools – Basic
    • Management Tools – Complete

At the moment we will not install “Reporting Services Add-in for SharePoint Products” because we do not have a instance running of SharePoint server. Click next to continue with the installation.

SQL-Server-Feature-Selection

The wizard will perform a couple of checks based on the features you have selected. If you pass all of the Rules click next to continue to the Instance Configuration. On the instance configuration screen you have the option to change the name of the SQL Server Instance. We will keep the default settings and click “next”  to continue.

Instance-Configuration

The Disk Space Requirements Step will show you if you have enough hard drive space to install SQL server if you pass this step click next to continue. This will bring us to the “Server Configuration” step. In this step we will have to fill in the accounts and passwords for the services.

Disk-Space-Requirements   Server-Configuration

Fill in the accounts that we have created in the first step:

Service Account Name
SQL Server Agent svc_sqlagent
SQL Server Database Engine svc_sqldbengine

 

When you proceed you will have the option to select the authentication mode off SQL Server and were the data files are saved. For now we will leave it to the default settings and we will only fill in the SQL Server Administrators. I always fill in the BUILTIN\Administrators group but because were are installing it on a domain controller it cannot find this group that’s why we will just add the current user.

Database-Engine-Configuration

Now that we have configured these last steps we are almost finished with the installation. The next step can be ignored and you can simple click next. The wizard will again check a few rules, when you pass these rules click next to go to the confirmation screen.

Error-Reporting   Installation-Configuration-Rules

In the confirmation window check every setting and click “Install”  to start the installation.

SQL-Server-2012-Installation  Installation-Complete

When the installation is complete you can close the wizard. You can then op SQL Server management studio by following these steps:

  1. Go to the Start Menu by using the Windows button or by going to the low left corner with your mouse.
  2. With the Start Menu open select “SQL Server Management Studio”.

SQL-Server-Management-Studio

With SQL Server installed we can start the Installation of SharePoint 2013. We will start this fourth part of the blog series when the SharePoint 2013 Public Beta is released.

Do not start Server Manager automatically at Logon – Windows Server 2012

After the installation of the new Windows Server version (Windows Server 2012 RC) it was annoying for me that the “Server Manager” started every time when I logged in to the machine.

In Windows Server 2008 R2 you could disable the auto start option from the home screen.Server-Manager---Manage-Menu I started searching for the option but couldn’t find it. After half an hour  I found the solution:

  1. Open the “Server Manager”.
  2. Select “Manage” on the top bar.
  3. Select “Server Manager Properties” from the drop down menu.
  4. Select the option “Do not start Server Manager automatically at logon”.

Server-Manager---Disable-automatically-logon

Install SharePoint 2013 Public Beta on Windows Server 2012 RC – Part I – Installation of Windows Server 2012 RC

With the new version of SharePoint almost in Public Beta (I have hopes it will be this month) it is time to show you how you can install it on the new Release Candidate of Windows Server 2012.

Since the new version of SharePoint isn’t there yet this series of blog post will begin with installing Windows Server 2012 RC on a Virtual Machine. After this post the following post will follow:

  • Part II – Installation of Active Directory and DNS Services on Windows Server 2012 RC
  • Part III – Installation of SQL Server 2012 on Windows Server 2012 RC
  • Part IV – Installation of the Prerequisites on Windows Server 2012 RC
  • Part V – Installation of SharePoint 2013 on Windows Server 2012 RC
  • Part VI – Configuring SharePoint 2013 on Windows Server 2012 RC

So let us begin with the installation of Windows Server 2012 RC. First off make sure you have a ISO available of Windows Server 2012 RC. If you don not have the image already download it from the Microsoft site:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/windows-server/2012-default.aspx

When you have downloaded the image you can create a new virtual machine and assign a appropriate amount of memory. I have created my VM with 6 GB of memory.

VM-Settings

Attach the image file to the virtual machine and then boot it. It will automatically boot the installation wizard of Windows Server 2012 with the language selection screen.

language-selection-screen

With the right language selected click ‘Next’  to proceed to the next step. The next step is easiest step of the installation. You only have to press the button “Install now”.

Install-now-step

When “Install now” is pressed the installation medium will load the actual setup files. In the mean time it will show you a dark blue screen with the waiting mouse cursor and the text “Setup is Starting”.

Setup-is-Starting

When all the files are loaded it is time to begin the actual setup of Windows. Basically the complete setup really look like the installation of Windows Server 2008 R2 so I think you can guess what is coming next.

Operating-System-Selection

Yep…. It is the Operating System selection screen. The only version available at the moment is the Windows Server 2012 Release Candidate Datacenter edition. You still have to take a good look because the installation disc also has the Server Core Installation. Choose the “ Server with a GUI” option and click next. Accept the license and again click next to go to the installation type screen.

Installation-Type

Like the installation of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 you have the option to upgrade your current Operation System. Since this is a complete new installation we choose for “Custom: Install Windows Only (Advanced)”.

In the next screen you will be asked to select the disk you would like to use for your installation. Select the right disk and click on “Next” .

Disk-Selection

After you selected the disk Windows will start installing the files to the specified disk.

Installation

When the installation is done the server will reboot and starts preparing Windows. Just like the old version you then will be asked to give in your Administrator password.

Administrator-Password

When you click the “Finish” the setup will finalize. After the finalization you will see the new ctrl+alt+delete screen.

ctrl-alt-delete-screen

Press ctrl+alt+delete and login to the server the desktop will be loaded and you are ready to start installing new windows component with the new Server Manager.

Windows-Server-Desktop

Like described at the top of the post this is the first post in a series of 6 posts. In the next post I will show you how to install the Active Directory component and the DNS component on Windows Server 2012 RC.

Windows PowerShell command builder

Today I found something interesting on the internet which I think can help everyone who is working with SharePoint. Microsoft has built a Silverlight application that can be used to build PowerShell commands.
 
Windows%20Powershell%20Builder
 
 
Microsoft says:
 
the Windows PowerShell Command Builder enables IT professionals and power users to visually assemble commands related to SharePoint 2010 Products and Office 365 on a Design Surface in a browser and take those commands to their respective products. The Windows PowerShell Command Builder provides an intelligent user experience. After you drag a verb or noun object on the Design Surface, the interface will hide either the verbs or nouns that are not associated with the verb or noun placed on the Design Surface. After you construct a command, you can copy the command to Windows PowerShell script, the SharePoint 2010 Management Shell, or other desired location to be saved or executed.
 
You use the tool by clicking here. You can also install it on your desktop by right clicking on the application.
 
Microsoft also released some guides to get started with the tool:

System.ServiceModel.FaultException: The server was unable to process the request due to an internal error.

For one of our clients we are working with a claims based web application. This web application has a custom membership provider that is registered at the web application, central administration and security token service level.

When we navigate to the site everything works perfectly but when we try to login with valid credentials we would receive an error like below:

Server Error in ‘/’ Application.



Runtime Error Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error

The server was unable to process the request due to an internal error.  For more information about the error, either turn on IncludeExceptionDetailInFaults (either from ServiceBehaviorAttribute or from the <serviceDebug> configuration behavior) on the server in order to send the exception information back to the client, or turn on tracing as per the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 SDK documentation and inspect the server trace logs.
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.ServiceModel.FaultException: The server was unable to process the request due to an internal error.  For more information about the error, either turn on IncludeExceptionDetailInFaults (either from ServiceBehaviorAttribute or from the <serviceDebug> configuration behavior) on the server in order to send the exception information back to the client, or turn on tracing as per the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 SDK documentation and inspect the server trace logs.

Source Error:

An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below. 

Stack Trace:

[FaultException: The server was unable to process the request due to an internal error.  For more information about the error, either turn on IncludeExceptionDetailInFaults (either from ServiceBehaviorAttribute or from the <serviceDebug> configuration behavior) on the server in order to send the exception information back to the client, or turn on tracing as per the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 SDK documentation and inspect the server trace logs.]
   Microsoft.IdentityModel.Protocols.WSTrust.WSTrustChannel.ReadResponse(Message response) +1161205
   Microsoft.IdentityModel.Protocols.WSTrust.WSTrustChannel.Issue(RequestSecurityToken rst, RequestSecurityTokenResponse& rstr) +73
   Microsoft.IdentityModel.Protocols.WSTrust.WSTrustChannel.Issue(RequestSecurityToken rst) +36
   Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSecurityContext.SecurityTokenForContext(Uri context, Boolean bearerToken, SecurityToken onBehalfOf, SecurityToken actAs, SecurityToken delegateTo) +26405809
   Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSecurityContext.SecurityTokenForFormsAuthentication(Uri context, String membershipProviderName, String roleProviderName, String username, String password) +26406316
   Microsoft.SharePoint.IdentityModel.Pages.FormsSignInPage.GetSecurityToken(Login formsSignInControl) +188
   Microsoft.SharePoint.IdentityModel.Pages.FormsSignInPage.AuthenticateEventHandler(Object sender, AuthenticateEventArgs formAuthenticateEvent) +123
   System.Web.UI.WebControls.Login.AttemptLogin() +152
   System.Web.UI.WebControls.Login.OnBubbleEvent(Object source, EventArgs e) +124
   System.Web.UI.Control.RaiseBubbleEvent(Object source, EventArgs args) +70
   System.Web.UI.Page.RaisePostBackEvent(IPostBackEventHandler sourceControl, String eventArgument) +29
   System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint) +2981


In our situation this error occurs within in the “Security Token Service Application”. The problem with this error message is that it isn’t the exact message of what is going wrong. To receive that error message that is occurring do the following:

  1. Open IIS and navigate to “SharePoint Web Services” under “Sites”. Click the node open and select “SecurityTokenServiceApplication” use your other mouse button to open the context menu and select “Explore”.

    image

  2. Windows explorer will open a new window. In this window you will see a web.config file. Open this file within a text editor and look for the following section:
<behaviors>
  <serviceBehaviors>
    <behavior name="SecurityTokenServiceBehavior">
      <!-- The serviceMetadata behavior allows one to enable metadata (endpoints, bindings, services) publishing.
           This configuration enables publishing of such data over HTTP GET.
           This does not include metadata about the STS itself such as Claim Types, Keys and other elements to establish a trust.
      -->
      <serviceMetadata httpGetEnabled="true" />
      <!-- Default WCF throttling limits are too low -->
      <serviceThrottling maxConcurrentCalls="65536" maxConcurrentSessions="65536" maxConcurrentInstances="65536" />         
    </behavior>
  </serviceBehaviors>
</behaviors>

In this section we will place a extra debug tag to include the errors that are occurring. The tag looks like this:

<serviceDebug httpHelpPageEnabled="true" includeExceptionDetailInFaults="true" />

This tag needs to be placed in the behavior tag. After you place the tag in the section it will look like this:

<behaviors>
  <serviceBehaviors>
    <behavior name="SecurityTokenServiceBehavior">
      <!-- The serviceMetadata behavior allows one to enable metadata (endpoints, bindings, services) publishing.
           This configuration enables publishing of such data over HTTP GET.
           This does not include metadata about the STS itself such as Claim Types, Keys and other elements to establish a trust.
      -->
      <serviceMetadata httpGetEnabled="true" />
      <!-- Default WCF throttling limits are too low -->
      <serviceThrottling maxConcurrentCalls="65536" maxConcurrentSessions="65536" maxConcurrentInstances="65536" />
      <serviceDebug httpHelpPageEnabled="true" includeExceptionDetailInFaults="true" />
    </behavior>
  </serviceBehaviors>
</behaviors>

After changing the “web.config” we received the correct message and we saw that we mistyped the role provider name.

Server Error in ‘/’ Application.


Cannot get Role Manager with name Empty. The role manager for this process was not properly configured. You must configure the role manager in the .config file for every SharePoint process.

Slow file transfer from Windows Explorer view to another Windows Explorer view of SharePoint.

Today I was replacing certain SharePoint documents for one of the projects we are working on. I noticed that the transfer of the document from Windows Explorer View to Windows Explorer view was very slow!! I mean 16,1 kb per Second slow!!!.

Investigating this problem I found that IE is configured to “Automatically detect settings”:

LAN_Settings

This was causing the WebDAV connection to work very slow. Disabling this obtain automatically made my transfer much faster. You can find this option by doing the following:

  1. In IE open the tools menu and click on Internet options.
  2. Click on the connections tab.
  3. Click on the Lan settings button.
  4. Uncheck the Checkbox and press ‘Ok’ to save the settings.