The first thing I checked was the build numbers of CRM Server and CRM Email Router (I just looked at the properties of sample DLLs in each respective bin directory). I found these to be different.  The CRM Server was Rollup 4, whereas the Email Router was RTM.

After installing Rollup4 for the Email Router, and rebooting, the router immediately kicked into life and began firing the backlog of email.

In addition to this there had been a change to the Deployment settings and Claims+IFD had been configured.  Although the Email router configuration had the correct URL set and was enabled, I have a hunch that a reboot was required following this change…

I also gave a session at the SPSUK event on a Business Intelligence case study of a project which has also kept me busy this year. This project was to deliver a prototype BI solution for TAFE Queensland using the Microsoft BI stack.  This was an extremely challenging but exciting project, and the aim of the presentation was to share my project experience and highlight some of the lessons learned.  I also demonstrated how to construct some reports from Excel when connected to an OLAP Cube, and also some of the PerformancePoint dashboards we delivered as part of the prototype.

My slides are available on SlideShare for your reference.  Please don’t hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions.

Yes, that’s right, I have decided to organise the traditional curtain raiser for the European Best Practices Conference – a five-a-side football tournament.  Game On!

The general idea is to bring together as many conference attendees, speakers and organisers together for a fun afternoon to catch up, play some football or simply spectate and grab a beer from the bar.  Many people will be travelling on Sunday from all over the world to meet at THE No1 SharePoint Conference, and this is a great way to meet up and literally ‘kick-off’ the week.

Here are the details:

Venue

Powerleague London City – 5-a-side pitch, all weather outdoor, bar on site (nice).  It is located between Old Street and Liverpool Street tube stations (about 10 minute walk from either).

Date/Time

Sunday 10th April, 4pm-6pm

Teams:

Last years ‘World Cup’ didn’t pan out to well thanks to the infamous Ash Cloud, and I have decided this year will be more of a Wacky Races style event with teams as follows:

- Combined Knowledge

- Lightning Tools

- Team US

- Team UK

- Team Rest of the World

Players:

I currently have a list of approximately 15 people who have expressed a wish to play.  If you do wish to play, please get in touch ASAP via email (mark@id-live.com) or Twitter (@m_macrae) or via a comment on this post.

I will contact all players shortly to inform them of kit requirements etc.

Spectators:

The more the merrier – just turn up if you can make it.

Sponsorship:

Obviously none of this comes for free.  Currently my organisation Intelligent Decisioning Ltd are sponsoring the pitch hire, but if anyone would be interested in sponsoring the SharePint afterwards for example, please let me know.

Ethos:

HAVE FUN

Scenario

You are attempting to import a CRM 4.0 organisation from one deployment to another. In my case, I was trying to import a copy of my production organisation into UAT.  During the import, the process fails with the following error in the import log:

10:55:16|  Error| Failed to add user using the DistinguishedName = CN=test test,OU=Test Users,OU=Restricted,DC=XXX,DC=local, Account Name = XXX\testSystem.Reflection.TargetInvocationException: Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation. —> System.DirectoryServices.DirectoryServicesCOMException (0×80072035): The server is unwilling to process the request. (Exception from HRESULT: 0×80072035)
   …
10:55:16|  Error| An error occurred when populating Microsoft CRM user groups. Ensure that CRM user accounts are accessible from the current domain and run the wizard again.System.Reflection.TargetInvocationException: Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation. —> System.DirectoryServices.DirectoryServicesCOMException (0×80072035): The server is unwilling to process the request. (Exception from HRESULT: 0×80072035)
  

Checks:

I was pretty confident this was a permissions issue on Active Directory due to the ‘System.DirectoryServices’ signatures in the error.  However the following checked out to be true:

- Account running the Import had rights on the destination OU and subsequent security containers to create objects (users) for the new deployment.  I double checked by running AD Users & Computers on the CRM Server as the account I used to run the import.  I then manually created some user accounts inside the CRM Security Groups e.g UserGroup_GUID

- Both source and destination deployments were on the same RollUp (Rollup 8 in this case).

Solution:

So the AD security all checks out.  Why on earth was the import failing??? During my frantic Googling, I came across a comment which suggested that the account used to run the Import MUST be in the same Domain as where the CRM deployment is based! 

My account wasn’t! This may sound strange, but the reason was that the CRM deployments originally lived inside the LONDON domain.  The production deployment was moved to a SWISS domain, but the CRM Users remained in the LONDON domain, including the CRM Admin user.  This was the guy I was using to run my failed import to UAT.  The domains were trusted both ways, and as I mentioned above, I had no problem manually adding users into the UAT security groups?

However, when I ran the import wizard using an authorised user account native to the UAT deployment’s domain, hey presto – the import was SUCCESSFUL!

I still do not understand why this matters, however I hope the solution helps someone out there one day!

I delivered this session at the inaugural SharePoint Saturday UK event which I also co-organised earlier this year.  Also more recently, I delivered this at the SharePoint User Group in Cambridge.

The key points I try to get across to the audience are as follows:

- All Business Intelligence tools built into SharePoint are only available with Enterprise CALs BUT its still a far cheaper alternative to the other big players. 

- For non Enterprise and even Foundation users, SQL Reporting Services (SSRS) is your friend.  If you have a Standard SQL 2008 R2 licence, make the most of SSRS to deliver dashboards, reporting and geo-spatial mapping.  You even have a top quality report authoring tool in Report Builder, and all your content can be managed like any other document (workflow, versioning etc).

- Again for the non-enterprise, take a look at the Google/Bing APIs for charting and mapping. 

- Lots of tools to solve quick (tactical) problems for BI in SharePoint such as the Chart Web Part, Status Lists

- Use PerformancePoint when you have OLAP Cubes as your data source.  It is the best tool for ‘exploratory’ reporting.

My presentation slides can be found on slideshare here: Business-Intelligence-Armoury-Whats-the-Best-Tool-for-the-Job

Enjoy! 

At the SharePoint User Group UK meeting on September 22nd 2010, I delivered this presentation on the subject, covering many of the considerations when planning a new SharePoint Deployment. 

Despite low attendance, everyone chipped in with their experiences and it was one of the most enjoyable sessions I have ever conducted.

My presentation is viewable here on SlideShare

But what about the remaining ProClarity features and views? Can you continue to run PAS after upgrading/moving to SharePoint 2010? When does support for PAS retire? Can any existing PAS views/reports be migrated over to PerformancePoint Services 2010?

All of the above, burning questions in my head and through much resourcing, and conversations with Microsoft PPS Product Team and Technical Advisory Service, I thought I would consolidate and share the information I have and the deductions I made from it…

Background

ProClarity Corp was acquired in 2006 by Microsoft to help accelerate Microsoft’s position in the Business Intelligence space.

The ProClarity Suite of products comprises the following:

Microsoft Support for the ProClarity Suite

There is a firm support timeframe for version 6.3 of the ProClarity suite of software available at the Microsoft Support Website. This basically provides clear dates for end of support:

Mainstream Support Retires: 10/07/2012

Extended Support Retires: 10/07/2017

Support for ProClarity in a SharePoint 2010 Farm

ProClarity is a separate product from SharePoint and PerformancePoint Services, with an entirely different architecture.  So much so, that ProClarity remains a 32-bit application only, whereas its posh offspring is now 64-bit only.

However, IIS7 supports a mix of 32-bit & 64-bit web applications on the same Web Server, and Microsoft supports having ProClarity installed on your SP2010 Web Servers – but is this wise?

In my view, if you wish to keep ProClarity Analytics Server running alongside your SharePoint 2010 Farm in order to access the features and richer designer plus your existing PAS content, you should keep PAS running on its own WFE server and well away from your SharePoint WFEs.  My reasons for this are as follows:

1. Microsoft advises this 

2. Treat ProClarity as if it were another substantial SharePoint Service Application.  It will consume resources, so scale out, and place this on its own server.

3. There are a number of configuration changes required to get the 32-bit ProClarity web server to run alongside your 64-bit SharePoint web applications.  Obviously you do not need to make risky changes to your farm if this thing gets pushed out to its own server.

Migration Path for PAS Content

There is currently no migration path for PAS content to PerformancePoint 2010. There are also no publicised plans to create this migration path. Therefore, when mainstream support expires in 2012, you would be left with a set of views/reports/dashboards with only an unsupported product to view them through and maintain them, and with no way of moving them off here other than manually recreating in PerformancePoint where possible.

In Summary

In light of the above, my advice would be to only persist with installing/configuring ProClarity alongside your SharePoint 2010 farm if you already have legacy ProClarity dashboards/views and you wish to continue to support these. 

I would advise against using ProClarity because of a business need to use a view which doesn’t exist in PerformancePoint.  It is likely that the view can be created using one of the other tools at your disposal e.g. Visio Services, SSRS, Excel Services…

If you do continue to use and create ProClarity views, just be aware that in under two years time, you could be unsupported and with no way of escaping it!

However I still come across many situations where a dedicated install account is never considered, and (more worryingly) even quite a few situations where installing using the Farm Account (also known as the DBA Account) is considered!

You should absolutely 100% NOT be installing SharePoint using the Farm account or any other service account, for the following reasons:

- It’s a service account and therefore should not have any logon rights at all.

- It should only have the permissions assigned to it by the configuration wizard.  None should be assigned manually before or after.

The Dedicated SharePoint Installation Account

A dedicated account should be used to Install SharePoint and any Service Packs/Hotfixes, run the Configuration Wizard, and run any STSADM/Powershell scripts on the farm.  This is because:

1) It is granted the highest permissions of any of the SharePoint server accounts, and you don’t want these privileges assigned to your service accounts:

Local Administrator on each SharePoint Server

SQL Server Roles: dbcreate + securityadmin

2) It has no influence on the running of the farm so if it gets locked out (because someone keyed in the test farm password three times for example) it has zero consequence.  It is even recommended it is disabled when not in use.

3) It also keeps things nice and tidy and prevents giving high permissions to Tom Cobley and all to perform farm admin. Yes, you may not be able to identify culprits who make mistakes, but you shouldn’t be giving this account out on a whim either.

This hangs over from MOSS 2007 and the best practise is pretty much identical.  Yes, there is a known bug with the User Profile service where admin rights must be temporarily raised on the farm account (but then rescinded), but this is no reason to do run any of the installation as MOSS Farm!

The only exception is when configuring a DEV machine, but if you train bad habits you’ll end up executing them for real!

Background

Basically, all the PPS assemblies reference v9.0.242.0 SQL assemblies (SQL 2005) and 4 key SQL 2005 packages from the SQL 2005 Feature Pack are pre-requisites before PPS 2007 can be configured.  Namely, these are:

- Microsoft ADOMD.NET (SQLServer2005_ADOMD)

- Microsoft SQL Server Native Client (SQLNCLI)

- Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services 9.0 OLEDB Provider (SQLServer2005_ASOLEDB9)

- Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Management Objects Collection (SQLServer2005_XML)

Issues Importing KPIs

So everything is finally configured and PerformancePoint Dashboard Designer seems to be working nicely with your data sources all set up etc…

But, when you try to create a new Scorecard based on existing KPIs in your SSAS Cubes, you find it fails with the following:

Looking inside the Event Log, you’ll find the following error:

The important stuff….

System.IO.FileNotFoundException: Could not load file or assembly ‘Microsoft.AnalysisServices, Version=9.0.242.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=89845dcd8080cc91′ or one of its dependencies. The system cannot find the file specified.
File name: ‘Microsoft.AnalysisServices, Version=9.0.242.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=89845dcd8080cc91′
   at Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Server.ImportExportHelper.GetImportableAsKpis(IBpm pmService, DataSource asDataSource)
   at Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Server.PmServer.GetImportableAsKpis(DataSource dataSource)

In other words…

The assembly which controls the import from SSAS (Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Server) has a reference to v9.0.242.0 of Microsoft.AnalysisServices which it cannot find.

Solution

Following many failed attempts to re-install the SQL 2005 components in order to get this assembly installed and references, I decided to manually copy this file from an existing SQL 2005 installation into the GAC of this server. 

This I did, however I then received a subsequent Microsoft.Analysis.Connection.Exception:

Microsoft.AnalysisServices.ConnectionException: Cannot connect to Analysis Services version ’10.0.1600.22′.
   at Microsoft.AnalysisServices.Server.Connect(String connectionString, String sessionId)
   at Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Server.ImportExportHelper.GetImportableAsKpis(IBpm pmService, DataSource asDataSource)
   at Microsoft.PerformancePoint.Scorecards.Server.PmServer.GetImportableAsKpis(DataSource dataSource)

The upshot is that v9 of the assembly is referenced, however I need v10 to be able to connect to my SQL 2008 repository.

So here’s what I finally did:

In .NET we can redirect the assembly bindings in the web.config.  I added the following to the Web.Config file for the PPS Monitoring WebService which Dashboard Designer uses to connect to SSAS:

  <runtime>
    <assemblyBinding xmlns=”urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1″>
    <dependentAssembly>
            <assemblyIdentity name=”Microsoft.AnalysisServices” publicKeyToken=”89845dcd8080cc91″ culture=”neutral” />
            <bindingRedirect oldVersion=”9.0.242.0″ newVersion=”10.0.0.0″/>     
    </dependentAssembly>
    </assemblyBinding>
  </runtime>

Saved the file and did a IISReset.

On reloading Dashboard Designer, I can now successfully Import my KPIs!!!

Additional Info

I must point out that this issue was on a single server development machine and as such, may be a quirk of my setup.  For starters I couldn’t get SQL Server 2005 SP2 Management Objects to install – and this problem may be the result of this. 

I haven’t tried using a separate client machine to import SSAS KPIs using PPS Dashboard Designer.

Regardless of the above, this may help some other PPS / SSAS developers out there who have experienced this problem.

Thanks

Thanks to my colleague Tony Pounder (@WorTony) for help with doing the .NET Assembly redirect statements.  Also, big thanks to Bill Wang’s blog entry on something similar, which led me down this path.

Introduction

In Project Server 2007 you may customise the SharePoint site which it provisions by default when creating a workspace associated with a project. This tutorial guides you through the steps required to achieve this.

Maintenance

Tip: For maintaining your custom Project Workspace going forwards, I recommend using your major/minor version numbers as part of the template (STP) filename and name.  Although version history can be switched on in the Site Template Gallery, Project Server requires that the STP is promoted to global (farm) status.  When you, or an administrator later comes to review which templates are currently global, the list does not include any version or date created information, making it difficult to establish if your latest changes indeed made it to global status.

Important!

Due to the way Project Server synchronises some data in the SharePoint Workspace with the Project Data held in the database, there are some lists which cannot have any fields removed, although it is OK to add new fields. The lists are as follows:

- Issues

- Risks

- Deliverables

Please minimise the customisations made to these lists.

Solution Tutorial

- Make all required customisations to your Project Server Workspace template. Remember to remove any list items which you have tested but do not want to include with the template.

- When complete, select Site Actions > Site Settings and select ‘Save site as template’ from the Site Settings page.

- On the ‘Save Site as Template’ page, supply the following data:

o A filename in the format: company_pwa_template_vX_X where X_X is the next available version number which is suitable based on the author’s discretion as to whether the changes are major or minor

o A template name in the format CompanyPWATemplatevX_X where X_X matches the filename above.

o Ensure the ‘Include Content’ check box is ticked. This will ensure the Project Overview document is included.

- Click OK

- After a short while, the template will be stored in the Site Templates gallery, and a page will display confirmation of this.

- Click the link to be taken to the Site Template gallery

- The gallery should display all previous versions of the template, including the latest one just saved.

This template has now been saved locally (to the Site Collection) however it must be promoted to global status for it to be picked up by Project Server settings.

- Click on the name of the template, and click the ‘save’ button when prompted

- Save the .stp file to a consistent location on a server in the farm (ideally the same server for consistency). If the file is saved on a local machine at this point, it must be transferred to the server at this stage.

o NOTE: All of the above steps can be completed on a client machine via the browser; however the next steps MUST be completed on one of the servers in the MOSS/Project Server farm, ideally the same server for consistency, by a Farm Administrator.

- Open a command prompt window, and change to the following directory location: 

o C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN

- Type and execute the following command:

o STSADM –o addtemplate –filename “Location\company_pwa_template_vX_X” –name “CompanyPWATemplatevX_X”

- After a short while, the command should complete with ‘Operation Successful’ message

- Type and execute the following command:

o iisreset /noforce

o NOTE: the above IISReset command is necessary for Project Server to recognise the global update. However this will affect all services on the Web Application hosting Project Web Access site collection for a brief period of time.

o NOTE: The workspace template is now published at a global (farm) level. The final steps can be completed from a client machine

- At the PWA Root Site, click the Server Settings menu from the left hand navigation, and select ‘Project Workspace Provisioning Settings’

- On the Project Workspace Provisioning Settings screen, select the new Default Project Workspace template from the list, and click Save.