Sp2013 AppDomain – YOu have to do what?

So after all this time, some people are still having issues with the app domain. I came across this little golden nugget of info after installing an app domain with a host header web application:

*Important – please note that if you are using Host Headers for your Web Application then you will need to create a new Web Application on port 80 that doesn’t use Host Headers. This Web App must have a root site collection which can be of any template. If you don’t do this then when you try to click on an App you will be met with a 404 error. This is because SharePoint uses the site running on Port 80 to resolve the app url, this must be a SharePoint site so the Default Web Site won’t work. Once you have created the Web Application and blank Site Collection do an IISRESET just to be sure. For more details on this check out Mirjam’s post here.

What is up with that?

SharePoint 2013 and Office WebApps: The Binding Dance Off!

After installing SharePoint 2013 and configuring it with Workflows and app domains, the last piece of the puzzle is to install Office web apps. Pretty simple really if you follow these steps from SOWMYANCS :Install, Configure & Monitor Office Web Apps 2013 for SP 2013

However, no matter what i tried, i couldn’t get office web apps to work quite right. It wanted to launch in the window, but it would get stuck there for 5 minutes then tell me the office webapp service was busy or this dandy error:

Word Document: “Sorry, Word Web App can’t open this document because the service is busy.  Please try again later.”

Word Document : “Sorry, there was a problem and we can’t open this document. If this happens again, try opening the document in Microsoft Word.”

I scoured the internet and nothing. Then it dawns on me. I had demoted this server from being a Domain Controller. Somewhere in the instructions i had read that OWA server cannot be a domain controller. But it doesn’t say it should have NEVER been one either.

I went ahead and installed a fresh copy of Windows Server 2012 with all the updates.

I went back to my SharePoint WFE and ran:

Remove-SPWOPIBinding –All:$true

I re ran the steps from the above article

New-OfficeWebAppsFarm –InternalURL "http://servername" -ExternalURL "http://servername.contoso.com" –AllowHttp -EditingEnabled

and it STILL DID NOT WORK CORRECTLY. Hmmmm…
Turns out that SharePoint remembers all your SPWPIzones from before. So if you wan’t external access you need to run this command to make sure you know what zone you are in:

Get-SPWOPIZone

Then make sure you set your spopizone to external by running this command:

Set-SPWOPIZone –zone “external-https”

Now it works.
Moral of the story, don’t reuse domain controllers, even if you have demoted them. They will always be bitter you demoted them.

Nando

SharePoint 2013 App Domains…like wrangling a 5 year old!

SharePoint 2013 has many awesome qualities which i will be discussing with you later, but there are some that give me that old UPS feeling of ineptitude. Yes folks, I am talking about deploying SharePoint Apps on a private hosted App Domain on SharePoint 2013.
This has to be the most problematic thing since the UPS Episode of ’10.
There are many nice MSDN articles on how to setup an app domain , but the most comprehensive one i have seen is this one:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/apps/fp179923%28v=office.15%29

Now. What they don’t tell you is that once you set it up all kinds of things will go wrong when they can go wrong. The most two frustrating ones for me where in Visual Studio: Unable to connect to SharePoint Dev site for debugging.
I fixed that one by adding a host entry.
The second one is the most vexing of all:
Error 1 Error occurred in deployment step ‘Install App for SharePoint’: Failed to install App for SharePoint.

I know it worked like 1 day ago. But it threw this at me like an un-catchable frisbee .
So i search the event log and say a bunch of these suckers:
The event viewer had an error occurring every minute – Event ID 6482 which states:
Application Server Administration job failed for service instance Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchServiceInstance (21e4447f-bac6-4a29-82db-165e074ac5db).
Reason: An update conflict has occurred, and you must re-try this action. The object SearchDataAccessServiceInstance was updated by domain\user, in the OWSTIMER (5040) process, on machine (server name). View the tracing log for more information about the conflict.
Technical Support Details:
Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPUpdatedConcurrencyException: An update conflict has occurred, and you must re-try this action. The object SearchDataAccessServiceInstance was updated by domain\user, in the OWSTIMER (5040) process, on machine (server name). View the tracing log for more information about the conflict.
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchServiceInstance.Synchronize()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.ApplicationServerJob.ProvisionLocalSharedServiceInstances(Boolean isAdministrationServiceJob)

Yeah, I know right!?
What the flagnog is that about?
So i did some googling and found the reason for this.
The file system cache on all FE’s on which the timer service is running needs to be cleared. Iam not sure why it needs to be cleared? But it does.
Below is the step by step provided by Microsoft:
Stop the Windows SharePoint Services Timer service (Found in Windows Services)
Navigate to the cache folder
In Windows Server 2008, the configuration cache is in the following location:
Drive:\ProgramData\Microsoft\SharePoint\Config
In Windows Server 2003, the configuration cache is in the following location:
Drive:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\SharePoint\Config
Locate the folder that has the file “Cache.ini”
(Note: The Application Data folder may be hidden. To view the hidden folder, change the folder options as required)
Back up the Cache.ini file.
Delete all the XML configuration files in the GUID folder. Do this so that you can verify that the GUID folder is replaced by new XML configuration files when the cache is rebuilt.
Note When you empty the configuration cache in the GUID folder, make sure that you do not delete the GUID folder and the Cache.ini file that is located in the GUID folder.
Double-click the Cache.ini file.
On the Edit menu, click Select All. On the Edit menu, click Delete. Type 1, and then click Save on the File menu. On the File menu, click Exit.
Start the Windows SharePoint Services Timer service
Note The file system cache is re-created after you perform this procedure. Make sure that you perform this procedure on all servers in the server farm.
Make sure that the Cache.ini file in the GUID folder now contains its previous value. For example, make sure that the value of the Cache.ini file is not 1.

Dont ask me why it works, because, well, i don’t work for microsoft. But it worked. After that i was able to deploy all my apps no problemo.

Enjoy My Fail.

Nando

SharePoint 2013 log in as different user link gone?

What the heck Microsoft? In the latest RTM build of SharePoint 2013 you will notice you can’t log in as a different user anymore. Why? I don’t know but i found a way around it.
Append this to your url :
/_layouts/closeConnection.aspx?loginasanotheruser=true

Boom it works. But why not include it with the new version?
TIP # 2.
Create a link with the log out code and at it to your front page:

http://yoururl/_layouts/closeConnection.aspx?loginasanotheruser=true.

there u go.
Nando.

Pro Status Achieved

Tuesday Dec 18, 2012 yours truly achieved Pro status for SharePoint 2010. So yeah, I passed the exam 70-668 exam. Man that sucker was hard. I think the test was more about how to read Microsoft’s version of “real” world requirement problems than it was about knowing sharepoint. Just my opinion, but i am very happy I passed.
However, the recruiting calls have picked up now. I get like 4 to 5 calls a day for SharePoint developer positions. Arg.
Oh well.
Thanks everyone for your support and if you need me to help with something, you can always hire me at http://www.sharepointinnovations.com.

YOur’s truly
Nando

Spc13 day 2

Today is all about sessions.
Right now I’m in the powershell 3.0 session.
Interesting stuff.

Spc 12 day 1

For all you people that did not attend, I will attempt to bring the conference to you. I will take pictures of every booth for you guys. Stay tuned!!!

Nando