Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SP1 Developer Evaluation VPC

For those needing to learn sharepoint but do not have the time or desire to install all the pieces.
Microsoft has provided an alternative. Thanks to JK for letting us know about this resource.

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SP1 Developer Evaluation VPC Image available at this link:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=1beeac6f-2ea1-4769-9948-74a74bd604fa&DisplayLang=en

This VPC is a set of virtual pc imgs from microsoft. It is a time expiring (sometime in fall of next year) img, but it does have the following all PRE-INSTALLED:- sharepoint, visual studio 2k8, sql server & sql studio, IIS properly configured

If you have any tips, tricks, resource you would like to share with the guild please email them to Susan Fischer at susan@clinchportal.com and we will post them.

Session state cannot be used in ASP.NET with Windows SharePoint Services

It appears that if Windows SharePoint Services is installed on the web server then none of your other applications can use session state.

When you have Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) installed on your
computer and when you browse the page that is set with session variables in the
Microsoft ASP.NET Web application, you may receive the following error message:

Session state can only be used when enableSessionState is set to true,
either in a configuration file or in the Page directive

The article below explains the situation more thoroughly.

Session state cannot be used in ASP.NET with Windows SharePoint Services
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;837376

If you come across any tips, tricks, resources or gotchas that may help others in dealing with SharePoint issues please email them to susan@clinchportal.com and we will post them here.

OWStimer.exe Memory Leak in Server 2008

It appears there is a leak in OWSTimer.exe and since SharePoint uses it intensly this could

lead to issues. This article has more information:

http://blogs.pointbridge.com/Blogs/pagnusat_tony/Pages/Post.aspx?_ID=23

If you have any tips, tricks, resources you would like to share email them to me at susan@clinchportal.com

OWSTimer.exe and sharepoint timer job administration

Someone pointed out this cool free addin to sharepoint that makes managing these jobs a little easier. You can check it out at the link below. You have to register but its free. A couple emails is worth it:

http://www.schaeflein.net/blog/2007/09/12/SharePointUtilityAdminstrationExtensionDownloadForSharePoint.aspx

If you have any tips, tricks, resources you would like to share email them to me at susan@clinchportal.com

SharePoint Offline

Has anyone had any experience with Sharepoint Offline type products?

I saw a few posting on a this one but they were very vague:
http://www.colligo.com/products/sharepoint/index.asp

Someone suggested this one:

http://www.kwizcom.com/ProductPage.asp?ProductID=212&ProductSubNodeID=254

If you have any comments on either of these or know of any other products that do this please post a comment with them or email them to me at susan@clinchportal.com

SharePoint Event Log Error: Windows NT user or group 'DOMAIN\Administrator' not found. Check the name again.

So your SharePoint install seemed to work but in the event log you are getting messages like this:

A runtime exception was detected. Details follow.
Message: Windows NT user
or group 'DOMAIN\Administrator' not found. Check the name again.
Techinal Details:
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException: Windows NT user or group
'RODINIA\Administrator' not found. Check the name again.
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlConnection.OnError(SqlException exception, Boolean
breakConnection)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlInternalConnection.OnError(SqlException exception,
Boolean breakConnection)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.TdsParser.ThrowExceptionAndWarning(TdsParserStateObject
stateObj)
at System.Data.SqlClient.TdsParser.Run(RunBehavior runBehavior,
SqlCommand cmdHandler, SqlDataReader dataStream, BulkCopySimpleResultSet
bulkCopyHandler, TdsParserStateObject stateObj)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.FinishExecuteReader(SqlDataReader ds,
RunBehavior runBehavior, String resetOptionsString)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.RunExecuteReaderTds(CommandBehavior
cmdBehavior, RunBehavior runBehavior, Boolean returnStream, Boolean async)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.RunExecuteReader(CommandBehavior cmdBehavior,
RunBehavior runBehavior, Boolean returnStream, String method, DbAsyncResult
result)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.InternalExecuteNonQuery(DbAsyncResult result,
String methodName, Boolean sendToPipe)
at
System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand.ExecuteNonQuery()
at
Microsoft.Office.Server.Data.SqlSession.ExecuteNonQuery(SqlCommand
command)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Data.SqlServerManager.GrantLogin(String
user)
at
Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.SharedResourceProvider.SynchronizeConfigurationDatabaseAccess(SharedComponentSecurity
security)
at
Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.SharedResourceProvider.SynchronizeAccessControl(SharedComponentSecurity
sharedApplicationSecurity)
at
Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.SharedResourceProvider.Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.ISharedComponent.Install()
at
Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.SharedResourceProvider.Provision()
For
more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp

I searched for hours for a solution and found lots of posts that were not clear on why. Here are the two reasons I found for it:

1. The user mentioned in the error does not have access to SQL Server
   CONFIRMATION STEPS: To determine this outside SharePoint simply go to Control Panel and create an ODBC Connection to the database and click test connection. If it fails then you hypothesis is right. If not try the second reason.


2. The user mentioned in the error does not have write access to SQL Server
   CONFIRMATION STEPS: You can either drop a simple app that connects to the database on the server or you could look at the security settings on the sql server in question and see if that user has write permission
3. I found an article on another reason for the error. If you are running SQL Server 2005 on a Windows 2000 box. Here is the article: http://www.tech-archive.net/Archive/SharePoint/microsoft.public.sharepoint.portalserver/2006-08/msg00949.html

The thing to note here is that there may be more than one SharePoint database. You may think its failing on the content database connection but it could be on one of the other databases or if its a farm you may not have configured it on one of the farm databases.

Another thing to try if the above do not work or you are not sure what its trying to connect to is to look at the ULS log. You can find this by looking in:

\program files\commonfiles\microsoft shared\web server extensions\12\logs\{Machinename -timestamp}

If you have any more info on this error or other tips, tricks, resources please email them to susan@clinchportal.com and we will post them.

Securing SharePoint

I found a really good article on SharePoint Security. It summarizes the concepts quite well.

Find the real article at:
http://www.finalcandidate.com/en/tandp/Pages/SharePointSecurityConcepts.aspx

Here is an even more brief summary:

One thing to remember about SharePoint is that it is built on Asp.Net which is built on IIS.Realizing this you will realize that SharePoint 2007 "inherits" a lot authentication providers from Windows and IIS

Internet Information Server:

• Basic
• Digest
• Certficates
• NTLM
• Kerberos

ASP.NET adds

• LDAP
• SQL Server
• Active Directory
• as well as quite a bit of extensibility.

I found an example of using a sharepoint list as an authentication provider at:

http://www.willierust.com/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=5

Forms-based authentication

HOWTO: Configuring a Office SharePoint Server 2007 Publishing Site with Dual Authentication Providers and Anonymous Access

http://www.andrewconnell.com/blog/articles/HowToConfigPublishingSiteWithDualAuthProvidersAndAnonAccess.aspx

Office SharePoint Server 2007 - Forms Based Authentication (FBA) Walk-through - Part 1

http://www.devcow.com/blogs/jdattis/archive/2007/02/23/Office-SharePoint-Server-2007-Forms-Based-Authentication-FBA-Walkthrough-Part-1.aspx

If you have any tips, tricks, resource you would like to share with the Guild, please email them to Susan Fischer at susan@clinchportal.com and we will post them here.

SharePoint Tutorials

Developing for SharePoint seems like such a large topic that its hard to know where to begin.
This topic will become a living document as we place links here to various topics and tutorials to help us all learn sharepoint:

1. WebParts - These elements are the foundation of SharePoint so it is best if we learn how they work. This tutorial will walk you through using an existing webpart and creating a custom webpart.
   
   http://www.tutorialized.com/view/tutorial/Web-Parts/10361
   

If you have a suggestion for a tutorial or topic that would be the logical next step in our learning curve, please email Susan Fischer at susan@clinchportal.com and she will post them here.

SharePoint developer explorer on Visual Studio 2008

I found the work around to get the sharepoint developer explorer to work with visual studio 2008.

http://blog.thekid.me.uk/archive/2008/03/20/using-the-sharepoint-developer-explorer-with-visual-studio-2008.aspx

If you come across any tips like this please send them to me at susan@clinchportal.com and I will post them here.

WSPBuilder - What is your experience? Do you have any alternative?

When it comes to building manifest files and deploying the sharepoint webparts, I am still a newbie. I came across this tool and it seems to work. I am just wondering what your experience is with this tool and if you are aware of any other tools that would be useful when working with SharePoint.

http://www.codeplex.com/wspbuilder

If you come across any tooks please email them to me at susan@clinchportal.com and we will post them here.

Installing SharePoint On Vista

I tried it an it actually worked quite well, provided that you follow the steps in this article exactly. I missed a couple of the subtle things they mentioned like choosing web application and NOT standalone as you would expect.

Also, there is the final security step in IIS to turn on Basic Authentication. Once I fixed those two issues it worked like a charm. Below is the link to the steps and software provided by bamboo solutions to help developers work on sharepoint applications without needing a server environment:

http://community.bamboosolutions.com/blogs/bambooteamblog/archive/2008/05/21/how-to-install-windows-sharepoint-services-3-0-sp1-on-vista-x64-x86.aspx

Additional Tip: After installing, you may run into this issue. If the central admin just shows a blank page then you need to go into iis and click on the central admin website. Once you have done so you will see an authentication folder or tab. Make sure basic authentication is enabled.
If you are running Vista Home then it does not support Windows Authentication so you must use basic.

If you have any sharepoint tips, tricks, resources you would like to share with other sharepoint developers, please email them to Susan Fischer at susan@clinchportal.com

SharePoint deleted my default directory!!!!

SharePoint deleted my default website. If you got in the same boat here are some ways back. It will not do it all for you but if you catch it quick enough you can save yourself some time rebuilding.

Default website was deleted
http://geekswithblogs.net/lorint/archive/2005/12/09/62737.aspx

Recreate Virtual IIS directories for exchange http://msmvps.com/blogs/kwsupport/archive/2004/10/02/14723.aspx

If you have any tips, tricks resources you would like shared with other sharepoint developers please email them to Susan Fischer at susan@clinchportal.com and we will make sure they are posted.

choosing the name of your configuration database

You may find that you don't want to use the standard configuration database name but use another one. If this is the case the following link provides instructions to help you out.

http://blogs.inetium.com/blogs/wpreston/archive/2007/03/12/psconfig-and-stand-alone-mode.aspx

If you know of any tips, tricks, resources that would benefit other sharepoint developers please email Susan Fischer at susan@clinchportal.com and she will ensure it get posted.

Access is denied starting Sharepoint wizard

The reason may be permissions but if you uninstalled and reinstalled sharepoint please see my previous post as it explains the other reason for this error:

http://www.eggheadcafe.com/software/aspnet/30290537/access-is-denied-except.aspx

If you have any tips, tricks, recommendations, warnings please email them to susan@clinchportal.com and I will post them on this blog.

Error during encryption or decryption. System error code 0

If you get this error when trying to start sharepoint services then you probably installed and uninstalled sharepoint to reinstall it but did not remove the admin database first. This article will assist you in fixing the issue:

http://kbalertz.com/927156/Error-message-SharePoint-Products-Technologies-Error-during-encryption.aspx

If you have any tips, tricks, recommendations, warnings please email them to susan@clinchportal.com and I will post them on this blog.

Secret to Connecting to Sharepoint internal admin database

During install it will allow you to set the database name but not the server in standalone mode. However the database is installed on the local sql server. See the following article for details:


http://blogs.inetium.com/blogs/wpreston/archive/2007/03/12/psconfig-and-stand-alone-mode.aspx


The database instance is using the microsoft internal database server on the same server but its hidden. This article shows you how to unhide it so you can manipulate it.


http://channel9.msdn.com/forums/TechOff/255490-How-to-connect-MICROSOFTSSEE/



If you have any tips, tricks, recommendations, warnings please email them to susan@clinchportal.com and I will post them on this blog.