Trying to figure out why SharePoint isn't working as expected isn't as overwhelming as it looks on the surface. SharePoint is built on top of familiar Microsoft products and technologies and comes with a lot of out of the box tools to help troubleshoot even the most difficult of issues. And when that doesn't work there are some great (free!) third party tools to aid you in your quest to fixing a farm. In this session we'll look at how IT pros and developers can troubleshoot any SharePoint farm without having to resort to exorcisms or Microsoft Support.

1. TROUBLESHOOTING ON PREMISES
SHAREPOINT
March 12, 2016
Jason Warren
Bonzai Intranet

2. Sponsors

3. DYNAMICOWL.COM
Jason Warren
SharePoint Server MVP
Infrastructure Architect at Dynamic Owl – jason@dynamicowl.com
(We make Bonzai Intranet www.bonzai-intranet.com)
Twitter: @jaspnwarren
Blog: jasonwarren.ca
Who Am I
4 | What We’re All About

4. DYNAMICOWL.COM
Today’s Agenda
01 Audience and Scope
02 Permissions for Troubleshooting
03 Windows and IIS
04 Diagnosing SharePoint
05 Other Tools
5 |

5. Audience and Scope

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Target Audience
SharePoint Developers
“SharePoint Administrators”
• Actual job title
• Other IT groups with SharePoint responsibility
• Help Desk
7 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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Session Scope
Real-world troubleshooting on-premises SharePoint
• Server, Foundation, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016
“What can I do to figure out why SharePoint isn’t working?”
8 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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Out of Scope
SharePoint Online
Exam prep
Troubleshooting SQL Server (beyond connectivity)
Troubleshooting customizations/third party tools
SharePoint development
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The SharePoint Black Box
SharePoint is built on common Microsoft technologies
Windows Server
Internet Information Services (IIS)
.NET
SQL Server
10 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

10. Permissions for Troubleshooting

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Access to Troubleshoot SharePoint
Member of the Administrators
local machine group on all
servers running SharePoint
12 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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Access to Troubleshoot SharePoint
Member of the SharePoint Farm Administrators Group
13 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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Access to Troubleshoot SharePoint
SharePoint Shell Admin for running PowerShell
14 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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Access to Troubleshoot SharePoint
PowerShell to grant a user Shell Admin on all content databases in the farm:
$ContentDatabases = Get-SPContentDatabase
foreach ($db in $ContentDatabases) {
Add-SPShellAdmin -Username EXAMPLEYou -Database $db
}
Note: can only be run against users. Cannot run for AD security groups
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Access Review
Member of the Administrators local machine group on all servers running
SharePoint
Member of the SharePoint Farm Administrators Group
SharePoint Shell Admin for running PowerShell
16 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

16. Windows and IIS
(Live Demo)

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Windows Summary
Reboot!
Task Manager, Process Explorer, Resource Monitor: quick insight
Performance Monitor: monitoring long-term
Baseline makes trending easier – every quarter or so
PAL: performance reports
Event Logs: Errors!
18 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

18. Windows and IIS
(Live Demo)

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Common HTTP Status Codes
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3xx Redirection
301 Moved Permanently
302 Found
304 Not Modified
2xx Success
200 OK
4xx User Error
400 Bad Request
401 Unauthorized
403 Forbidden
404 Not Found
5xx Server Error
500 Internal Server Error
503 Service Unavailable

20. Diagnosing SharePoint
(Live Demo)

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SharePoint Diagnostic logs
Text files with:
• Events (something happened!)
• Traces (narrating what happens)
Increase verbosity to aid troubleshooting
Central Admin and PowerShell controls
Get the CORRELATION ID for best results!
22 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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ULS PowerShell Reference
New-SPLogFile: stops logging to the current file and creates a new logfile on all servers in
the farm
Set-SPLogLevel: changes the verbosity of logging
• Set-SPLogLevel -EventSeverity Verbose -TraceSeverity VerboseEx
Clear-SPLogLevel: resets verbosity to default
Merge-SPLogFile: consolidates logs from all servers in the farm into a single file
Merge-SPLogFile -Path .Example.log -Correlation <correlation>
• MOST POWERFUL SHAREPOINT TROUBLESHOOTING STEP
23 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

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Tool Reference
PAL http://pal.codeplex.com
ULS Viewer https://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/download/details.aspx?id=44020
Fiddler http://www.telerik.com/fiddler
Sysinternals (Process Explorer, TCP View) https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals
PortQry http://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/download/details.aspx?id=17148
SharePoint Search Query Tool https://sp2013searchtool.codeplex.com
SharePoint Manager https://spm.codeplex.com
24 | Technical Upgrade Guidance

24. Questions and Answers
PICK OUR BRAINS

25. Let’s Keep In Touch
CONTACT DETAILS

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Wrap-up: Contact Details
Jason Warren
E jason@dynamicowl.com|
T @jaspnwarren
W dynamicowl.com
B jasonwarren.ca
27 | Contact Details