The Joys of a SharePoint Install

I have just now finished installing my first VM of the newest version of SharePoint. I decided to start with SharePoint Foundation (SPF), the successor to WSS. In effect this is WSS 4.0, but renamed as is MS' wont. Here is a guide to how I went about it and as I blog about my experiences with SharePoint 2010, it will be with this setup, or one of its descendants. FWIW I am using VMWare's Workstation VM's

First this is the layout of host and guest machines: my host machine is a Dell Latitude E6400, with 4GB of memory running Windows XP. Even under the best of circumstances there is less than the 4GB of memory available since there is no dedicated Video RAM, so there is only 3.62 GB available for programs. According to Microsoft, and most other bloggers, the minimum recommended is 8 Gigs of RAM and a 64 bit OS on the guest. If there is any mitigating factor here it may be that that recommendation is based on using MS' Hyper-V.

I created one VM for a Domain Controller (DC) with 384 Megs of RAM and 20 Gigs of disk space; a second for Sql Server also with 20 Gigs of disk space and 512 Megs of RAM; and a third for SharePoint itself. This last machine I allocated 30 Gigs of disk space and a full Gig of RAM. In retrospect I think I would have combined the DC and SQL machines into one that I could clone for future machines.

On the VM I added only the DC role, then added the same service accounts as Scott Hillier recommended for SharePoint 2007. My reasoning here is that although 2010 has different specifics, particularly the Service Provider model, much is the same with regard to overall concepts. I also added a number of accounts I could use to try various scenarios with regard to permissioning, etc. The official guide from Microsoft to the service accounts for Foundation (WSS) can be found here, or for Server here. Their actual installation instructions can be found here.

In short here are the accounts that I created for use by SharePoint:

 

On the Sql box added the App Server and Web Server roles, then I installed Sql Server 2008. At first I tried R2 CTP, but it did not seem to install properly, and decided it was not worth the trouble to figure that out, as my real priority was to get SharePoint up and running. Having done that, I installed Service Pack 1. I also read somewhere that it was necessary to get Sql Server up to version 10.0.2740, and the place to get that is here. As of this writing there is a Cumulative Update Package 5 for Sql Server 2008 Service Pack 1. I did add the domain account that I will use as the configuration account, SPConfigAcct, to the securityadmin and dbcreator roles on Sql Server, but also, to make sure, I cheated by adding to the sysadmin role as well. Definitely not a best practice in a production environment.

To sum it all up here is the overall layout of my infrastructure prior to installing SharePoint itself:

	DC	SQL	SharePoint
HD Size (Gb's)	20	20	30
RAM (Mb's)	384	512	1024
Roles	DC	App Server, Web Server	App Server, Web Server

 

Before going any further there are still a couple of issues to address on the SharePoint box. First is that a necessary hotfix for Windows 7 and Windows Server R2 installations that may use service applications is Installation notice for the SharePoint Server Public Beta on Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 and Microsoft Windows 7. Also you will want to disable the loopback adapter and the instructions for that can be found here: here.

Now that I am ready to install SharePoint itself I reviewed a few blog posts. The ones I found most helpful are the following:

SharePoint Joel: 10 Tips Troubleshooting Installations for SharePoint 2010 and SharePoint Foundation

Jie Li's GeekWorld: SharePoint 2010 Pre-Requisites Download Links

And

MSDN: Setting Up the Development Environment for SharePoint Server

The first step to the actual install is to download the file then copy to a local folder. In my case I put it in a newly created folder I named SharePointFoundtion. Then I extracted the files to another folder, which I named SharePointFiles. The command for doing so is C:\ SharePoint\ en_sharepoint_foundation_2010_beta_x64_456151.exe /extract:C:\SharePointFiles. NOTE: the Microsoft documentation says that the name of the file will be SharePoint.exe, but what you see, that long file name that I do not want to retype, is what I got. The next step is to verify that all the prerequisites have been met. This is done by running the program PrerequisiteInstaller.exe found among the newly extracted files. This takes a while to run, so go get some coffee, you may need it.

Somehow all my prerequisites were met so maybe a little preparation and research does have some value after all, who knew? Going to the extract folder there is a folder Files, and under there another one named Setup, and there you will find a file named config.xml. I opened it up and added the following additional line:

    <Setting Id="AllowWindowsClientInstall" Value="True"/>

Within the section configuration. The one last piece is that I need to add the user that I will use for the config account to the Administrators group on the server that will be hosting SharePoint. In my case the account is SPConfigAcct.

Now, at long last, we are ready for the big moment. I went to where I extracted the files, in my case C:\SharePointFiles, and ran the file setup.exe. When I did that I got a fairly standard license from on which I clicked 'I accept the terms of this agreement'. After clicking Continue I got this screen:

For the sake of getting the full SharePoint experience I selected 'Server Farm'. Then on the Server Type screen

I selected Complete then 'Install Now'. After much processing and shuffling of bits I then saw this familiar looking screen:

Microsoft's instructions, referenced above, tell me that I can open a command prompt and see the logs by typing in cd %temp%. I found many tmp files, 25 in fact, but no log files, (dir /od *.log), whoohoo. The instructions also suggest, to put it mildly, that I stop here, and go get the Sql 08 update here. This kb contains two files, one of which is the Cumulative Update (CU) that I installed above. The other one could not update anything either since my Sql Server was all updated to level 2740. Now I can run the Configuration Wizard.

At the first screen I clicked Next, and Yes to the warning. Then I select 'Create a new server farm'. The next screen is the Specify Configuration Database Settings and here are the setting I used:

I then had to create a passphrase, then the normal port number and security settings questions. I accepted the supplied port number, and NTLM. I then got more or less the same screen as the one for WSS 3.0, with the exception that there is a button for 'Advanced Settings'. When I clicked that I got this screen:

I skipped it this time but note that it is worth further research. Canceling out of there I go back to the previous screen and click Next, which begins the configuration process. All went well so I got to this screen:

Now I click 'Finish' and wait for it to run through its steps, in full expectation that all will go well. One issue that I ran into was that when the wizard was done it brought me to the Central Admin site but it was blank. The url was the server name and port number, plus one of the usual long url's of SharePoint. I played around with it and finally found that it needs to use localhost, rather than the name of the server itself. Even when I use the default shortcut under Programs, it uses the server name, and I had to create a new shortcut pointing manually to localhost.

In future posts I will review how to use the new setup to create and manage sites. However, before I can do that I have to install Visual Studio 2010, so before I continue I will do that …