Move subsites into separate site collections in SP2010

Recently one of our customer created a ticket and requested to move some of his subsites to separate site collections. I think this will be genuine requirement for everybody as rather than keeping the subsite, it’s better to keep a separate site collection.  

I worked on this request and thought of sharing with everybody so that it would be beneficial for the complete community.

Let me explain in basic manner so that there would be no confusion:

Let’s assume here are my subsites:

http://sharepointknowledgebase/sites/amolsplanet/amolshistory

http://sharepointknowledgebase/sites/amolsplanet/amolsbiography

I wanted to convert / move the above subsites into separate site collections so that they would looks like:

http://sharepointknowledgebase/sites/amolshistory

http://sharepointknowledgebase/sites/amolsbiography

Resolution:

Steps are pretty simple so nothing to worry about and we can easily achieve this requirement without any issues.

Note: If you have a requirement like the mentioned above and don’t have sufficient rights to do the operation on your own then request you to forward the requirement to your SharePoint Administrators so that they can complete this task based on your requirements.

Please refer the following commands which are very helpful in accomplishing the requirements:

Export command:

Export-SPWeb -Identity <URL of the subsite> -Path <Filename> -IncludeUserSecurity

By using the above command we can take the backup of the subsite.

Import command:

Import-SPWeb http://site -Path D:\export.cmp -UpdateVersions –Overwrite

By using the above command you can restore the subsite backup to the site collection that you want as per your requirements.

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know. I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issues, Thank you.

How to create a subsite in SP2010

Subsite is an integral part of site collection. There are several uses of subsite for which you can deal with as well as manage almost the same set of operations that you can do from the top level site.

Many organisations have some security policies and they don’t permit complete leverage to the owners to manage the complete site collection but one thing is very good that at list they can create multiple subsites as per their requirements.

Today’s topic is based on the same and would like to share this basic information with all of you so that there would not be any confusion in creation the subsite.

Here are the details:

-Open the website on which you are dealing with

-site actions

-site settings

-site administration

-sites and workspaces

-Create

-Enter the title, URL, select the appropriate template and click OK.

By this way you can create a subsite in an easy without being dependent on others / without referring any article or document/ without asking for help from anybody/ without taking any training.

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know, Thank you. 

Access Services is unable to process the request.

Few days before I worked on one access issue but at that time the exception was different and this time we faced new error message.

Problem description:

While working on asset database site, trying to create new item and got the following exception.

Error message:

Access Services is unable to process the request. Click here to try again

Let me tell you access service application was already created and properly working without any issues.

Troubleshooting done:

-Checked the status of the access service application

-Checked the access SA proxy-whether it’s been properly associated with that web application or not.

-Checked the SharePoint logs as it is the most important location where we can find the cause behind it.

-Checked the event logs for any noticeable event id based on access.

-Try opening your SharePoint website in Firebug (Firefox utility) and check what exactly it’s blocking.  

IMP POINT:

Make sure that your foundation web application service and access services are running on the same box.

Please refer this for detail information: http://sharepointknowledgebase.blogspot.in/2013/08/unexpected-error-occurred-while-running.html

Resolution:

-Do IISRESET and check the results.

-If you check the logs and find any traces on security token service not working then you need to provision the security token service application.

Get-SPServiceApplication

$sts = Get-SPServiceApplication | ?{$_ -match "Security"}

$sts

$sts.Status

$sts.Provision()

If you have any different resolution apart from mentioned above then please share here so that it would be useful as well as beneficial to others as well.

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know, I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issue, Thank you.

Operation is not valid due to the current state of the object

Every day we face some strange issues in SharePoint, if it’s working before then why it suddenly stops working! Big question-hmm??

Today we are going to discuss one similar scenario and I am pretty much sure you will comes up with different resolution’s because this issue might vary from environment to environment so resolutions might be different.

Problem description:

One of our content database has already reached the 100GB mark so as per Microsoft recommendations, it’s better to move the site collections to new database as it might create some problems while doing backup and restore. So the plan to move some site collections from existing database to new database. For this purpose, we have created a new database by means of central administration.

One thing I wanted to clear that we are doing backup-restore activity, we are moving some heavy site collections between databases only.

In SharePoint 2010, we have an inbuilt command to move the site collections between databases, please refer the following:

Move-SPSite <http://ServerName/Sites/SiteName> -DestinationDatabase <DestinationContentDb>

So we make modifications as per our databases i.e. URL of the site collection and name of the destination database.

As soon as we hit enter, the PowerShell command throws an exception as mentioned below.

Error message:

Move-SPSite: Operation is not valid due to the current state of the object

Troubleshooting done:

-Checked the status of site collection-whether it’s set to lock/read only?

-Checked the status of the database-whether it’s online/offline?

-Tried detaching the source and destination databases and reattached again but still no results

-Tried moving site collections to existing databases- this one works!

-Tried creating a site collection in newly created database- works!

-The site that we have just moved to existing DB- tried moving to the destination database (where we are facing to problem)- Failed!

-Tried creating a new database for different web application and performed the same operation- Failed!

-checked the health analyser again to verify for any new errors

-Found this error which we have neglected-Databases running in compatibility range, upgrade recommended.

<This is the main culprit>

Resolution:

We ran this command on the source database from which we were trying to move the site collections to destination database.

upgrade-contentdatabase -Name <> -Webapplication <>

Operation completed successfully.

Tried running the move-spsite command and executed successfully without any issues…

By this way we have overcome this error message but as I mentioned in the beginning resolution might vary from environment to environment so request you to please share if you have different resolution part from the above mentioned so that it would be beneficial to others as well.

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know, I would be more than happy to help you as well resolves your issues, Thank you.

Product Applies To:

SharePoint Server 2010

SharePoint Foundation 2010

SharePoint Server 2013

Unexpected error occurred while running macro in projects Web Database Site

So here it comes another issue that we faced as well as resolved it by taking some proper configuration steps as per recommendations from Microsoft. It was not a trickiest one but still took some time to drill down to resolution.

What was the exact issue? / Problem description?

User was trying to add new projects on SharePoint 2010 “Projects Web Database” site.

Error Message:

Unexpected error occurred while running macro.

Here are some links that i have read before starting troubleshooting on this issue. Following links will help you to understand the detail background of project web database as well as role of access services.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-in/templates/projects-web-database-TC101114815.aspx

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/video-use-the-projects-web-database-template-VA101794588.aspx

http://office.microsoft.com/en-in/sharepoint-server-help/build-an-access-database-to-share-on-the-web-HA010356866.aspx

Troubleshooting steps:

-Issue was restricted to project web database site.

-checked the access services are activated or not.

-If they are activated then on which servers they are a part of i.e. are they activated on the app server or front end server.

-checked the SP logs to find out the root cause.

-checked the event logs to look out for any specific event id’s

Resolution:

As per the Microsoft recommendations, whichever the server is- access services and foundation web application services should be running on the same server.

When we checked the status of access services, they were activated on the APP server but if it’s an app server then Foundation web application service should be in stopped state, so we can’t start the foundation web application services on the app server. If we do this then we are converting the app server into another WFE which is totally wrong and not required.- This is a wrong configuration!

What we did?

We have stopped the access services on the app server and started them on the front ends where the foundation web application service is already running…

That’s it- after this issue has been resolved and we are able to add new projects in a project web database site in SharePoint 2010.

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know, I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issues.

If you have some different resolution apart from the above mentioned then request you to share the same so that it would be beneficial to others as well. Thank you…

Product Applies To:

-SharePoint Server 2010

-SharePoint Foundation 2010

-SharePoint Server 2013

Unable to display this webpart + navigation add link not working in SharePoint 2010

One of our users has opened a ticket that some default functionality is not working as expected. If somebody mentioned as ‘default functionality’ then it means out of box and no customizations at all. Furthermore, probed the user and gathered the details.

-Issue was farm wide i.e. across all web applications / all site collections

Problem description:

User was trying to add one of the existing list/libraries link by means of navigation,

here are the complete details to reproduce the issue:

-Open the site

-site actions

-site settings

-Look and Feel

-Navigation

- Select either global navigation or current navigation

-Add link

-Click on Browse

-Two panes will be reflected i.e. left pane and right pane

-if you select any entity from the left side then it has to show in the right side but you will get the following error in the right side.

Error Message:

Unable to display this Web Part. To troubleshoot the problem, open this Web page in a Microsoft SharePoint Foundation-compatible HTML editor such as Microsoft SharePoint Designer. If the problem persists, contact your Web server administrator.

Correlation ID: xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxx

Resolution:

We have opened a ticket with Microsoft and got to know this is known issue and happening because of recently installed windows update: KB2844286

As per the information conveyed from them- "Both the SharePoint and .NET product groups are aware of the issue and they are in the process of fixing the patch"

Removing windows update: KB2844286 is the only solution at this time.

Once you remove the update then please restart the server. Thank you.

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know, I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issues.

If you have any other resolution apart from the above mentioned then request you to please share so that it would be beneficial for others as well.

Security token service is not available- SP2010

Security token plays an important role with respect to authentication purpose, if this stops functioning then you will start getting so many tickets regarding access as well as critical tickets which are dependent on the same as few other services are also dependent on this service i.e. security token.

Here is the Microsoft link which talks about in details on security token:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee806864(v=office.14).aspx

While doing the sanity check across all front ends, we have noticed the security token service exception in the event viewer logs with respect to one of the server.

Here are the details:

Error message: Security token service is not available.

Checked the IIS status and found all the application pools and websites were in stopped status.

Started all the SharePoint entities which were in stopped status.

Checked the rule again and it was not there in the HA (Health Analyzer) list anymore.

Issue resolved, we are good now. Thank you.

Few IMP points which are essential while troubleshooting this issue:

In our case, the security token service was working initially without any issues and the farm was already built properly. But in your case, if it’s a newly built farm then it might be a hotfix issue as per this Microsoft article:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2493524

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh564135(v=office.14).aspx

If you have any queries regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know, I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issues.

Also-if you have a different resolution regarding the same issue then request you to share the same so that it would be useful to other as well. Thank you.