I've always been one that thought if I followed the directions, I should end up with an expected result.

My bank doesn't agree.  Not only is their web site misleading, but it also doesn't work.  And then, when you call their "Customer Service" number, the automated voice lies to you and you end up stuck where you can't get out and you have to call back.

I can change banks but, alas, I can't change Microsofts and I can't change SharePoints; there's only one of each.

So, if your following along, you're aware that I'm trying to get a three server farm running.  And I'm trying to do it exactly like the instructions say.

At this point, I can see Central Admin and I'm running the the Read First... task that says Read the Quick Start Guide.  So I'm reading the Quick Start Guide and it's got a section for server farms.  Here, the first heading is configure services.

The first service is the MOSS Search Service.  Not a problem.  I have a dedicated index server and a dediated service account.  I did make a note that the insctuctions do not specifically tell you to select your index server from the change server option in the pull down list before you tell it to Use this server for indexing content or Use this server for serving search queries.

The second service under this heading is the Web App Service. I found that this paragraph incorrectly suggests that the Web App Serivce would NOT be running on my servers since I installed them as Compete servers.  Both my server were, in fact already running the Web App Service.  Not correct, but not a problem.  I figured I was rolling.

The next heading is Configure the Shared Services Provider.  This involves creating web apps for the SSP admin site as well as for MySites.  Now I like my MySites to have their own host header because I want my users to be able to just type http://mysite in their browser and get their MySite.  So they need their own web app.  In addition, No matter what I do, my SSP admin site ends up with a URL of http://ssp/ssp/admin which seems silly.  But I got Shared Services running and I got my SSP Admin site.

Am I rolling or what.

Well, the correct answer would be "what" cuz here the wheels fall off.

The next item on the Quick Start Guide is Configure Indexing which should be no problem.  The first step is Configure default content access account. No problem, I got one of those.

Then we get to Content sources and crawl schedules.  Of course, I want to crawl my local MOSS sites so I edit that item in the list.  All I need to do is create the crawl schedule and, sure enough, there's the Create Schedule link.  I click it and fill it out and stick your fingers in your ears:

Access is Denied (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80070005 (E_ACCESSDENIED))

So we go looking and meet our new best friend Andy who points us to: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/926959

Apparently we have to add the wss_wpg user to the tasks folder but the taks folder is a system folder that does not have a security tab so we have to make it not a system folder, add the user and then make it a system folder again.  Sounds kind of like my bank.

So at the command line, revert the tasks folder to a common folder by running this:

attrib -s c:\winnnt\tasks. 

You have to restart Windows Explorer to see the changes but, now, when you right click on the tasks folder and select Properties you see it has a Sharing and Security tab like all the other folders.  On the Security tab, you add the wss_wpg user.  It matters that this is a local user and not a domain user because you have to change the source location by clicking on the location button.  The kb article says to give the user read and write permissions.  That's simple enough and then you click Apply.

Don't forget to go back to your command line and run

attrib +s c:\winnnt\tasks. 

This will reset the system folder attribute on the tasks folder.  Now when you right-click on it and select Properties all you'll see is a General tab.

Then it says to restart IIS so I restart IIS on both servers and try my schedule again.

Thank you for banking with us.  I think I will change banks, the new branch up at the corner has a hot ATM.

-robot

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Posted 02-26-2008 10:44 AM by SPRobot