using (SPSite site = 
 
 new SPSite("https://SHAREPOINT_SITE_URL"))
 
 using (SPWeb web = site.OpenWeb())
 
 {
 
 SPList list = web.Lists["LIST_TITLE"];
 
 SPField field = list.Fields["FIELD_NAME"];
 
 field.Indexed = true;
 
 field.Update();
 
 }
 

For Office 365 or for SharePoint on-premises farms that you can only access remotely you can do it using CSOM as follows:

ClientContext Cx = 
 new ClientContext("https://SHAREPOINT_SITE_URL");
 
 List L = Cx.Web.Lists.GetByTitle("LIST_TITLE");
 
 Cx.Load(L);
 
 Cx.ExecuteQuery();
 
 Field f = L.Fields.GetByTitle("FIELD_NAME");
 
 f.Indexed = true;
 
 f.Update();
 
 Cx.ExecuteQuery();

* Last updated: 11/07/2015

Now that the product’s preview is out (Can be downloaded from here), I have had the chance to deploy an instance on my Azure machine and wanted to share quickly few of the new features compared with SharePoint 2013.

Before I list the new features, I wanted to summaries few important points:

• The site UI (Look and feel) is the same compared to SharePoint 2013
• SharePoint 2016 has better support for mobile and touch experience. (I haven’t tested that yet though)
• InfoPath is supported in SharePoint 2016. You can use InfoPath designer 2013 with SP 2016
• SharePoint designer 2013 works with SharePoint 2016
• Workflow Manager still is part of SharePoint 2016
• MOSS 2007 workflows are supported in SharePoint 2016
• Sandboxed Solutions are still supported
• SharePoint 2016 only comes in the full server version. A Foundation (Free) version will not be released for SharePoint 2016.
• Excel Services is not longer part of SharePoint in the 2016 version. It's part of the Office Online Server (AKA: Office Web Apps) product
• SharePoint 2016 doesn't support standalone install mode
• Stsadm.exe command line tool still exists and will ship with SharePoint 2016
• Note that SharePoint Apps now are called SharePoint Add-ins
• SharePoint 2016 will provide no downtime patches to avoid production interruption during the application of CU update

Here is a list of new things I found that are introduced to SharePoint server 2016:

- Server roles: A setting that allows you to define the role of a SharePoint server and help you maintain the best performance of the desired server role. We have different roles available:

• Front-end
• Application
• Distributed Cache
• Search
• Custom
• Single Server Farm

You will get the following screen when you run the configuration wizard to add a new server to an existing farm or when you create a new farm:

You also can change the server role from central admin: System settings | Servers | Convert server role in this farm

- App launcher. If you have used Office 365 recently you will be familiar with this cool gadget. It allows you to navigate between SharePoint, OneDrive & newsfeed. It will be extensible and customizable as well.

- Enhanced simple controls (for document library). This allows you to execute simple commands like: new, share, upload …etc.

- Larger content databases sized at TBs not GBs. The numbers are not announced as of yet. It used to be, 200GB recommended per content db and a maximum of 4 TB (under certain conditions) for SharePoint 2013.

- Added the support of 100K site collections per content db up from 10K for SharePoint 2013.

- Increased the list threshold more than 5000 items per view\query. Numbers to be announced later this year.

- Increased the maximum file size to 10 GB up from 2 GB for SharePoint 2013. Make sure you increase the maximum file upload limit in the web application settings in Central admin if you want to test this out. Please note if you increase the limit above 10 GB and try to upload a file using the explorer view, the file will look like it uploaded successfully, however, you will notice that the file got uploaded with 'Zero' bytes. Hopefully that gets fixed in the RTM version.

- Search index size increased from 250 million supported items per farm to 500 million items.

- Added automatic list column indices management to make it easier for SharePoint users to create and use large lists without worrying too much about indexing.

- Improved and stabilized distributed cache (App Fabric). App Fabric is announced to be discontinued already as a standalone product but the product group will continue to support it as a component part of SharePoint.

- Added the support of the BITS Protocol instead of COBALT for file transfer. BITS utilizes an unclaimed bandwidth to enhance file transfer experience.

- Microsoft Project Server 2016 (PWA) is now part of the SharePoint product (install) but still requires a separate license.

- Improved bidirectional sync with active directory. FIM (Forefront Identify Manager) product is removed from the SharePoint media (Install). Added support for external standalone FIM product\service.

- Added a new site collection template called “Compliance Policy Center”. It allows you to manage policies and assign policies to SharePoint site collections to help you enforce your organization governance requirements.  It includes the ability to discover sensitive information like “Social security number”, credit card numbers …etc. You also can add document delete policies.

- Added a new Site collection template called “In-Place Hold Policy Center”

This allows you to manage governance policies across site collections.

 - Introduced Fast Site Creation, SharePoint will leverage master copies for common site templates (I.e. STS0) to do a SPSite.Copy at the content db level to speed up site collection creation.

- Added 115 new PowerShell commandlet, a lot of them existed before part of the Project Server when it was a separate install, the rest are brand new that provide more control on server administration, integration with the cloud for hybrid scenarios …etc.. Here is a list of all the new commandlets:

- Added durable links feature. This provides resource Id based URL to make it easier to locate documents with their URL no matter where you move them.

- Added two new features for document libraries:

     Generate a file plan report for a folder in document library:

      Change enterprise metadata and keywords settings

- Added SMTP Connection encryption for outgoing email. You can use custom ports & enable SSL …etc.

- Enabled Office 365 hybrid scenario integration with SharePoint 2016 on-premises through central admin.

You can configure one of two different integration scenarios:

• OneDrive & Sites
• OneDrive only

- Tags and Notes are deprecated and users will no longer be able to create new tags\notes or access existing ones.

- You can easily configure SSL for central admin using PowerShell:

 I tried to cover most of the new futures I came across. Let me know what else I should add to the list. Here are few links that has more information:

• New and improved features in SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview
• What's deprecated or removed from SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview

• Long PowerShell scripts in this article have been wrapped to multiple lines to be readable, make sure you use a single line when you try to execute them
• Snapshots and scripts have been modified to remove account identifying information for security reasons

Now with the support of ARM (Azure Resource Manager) you can manage the lifecycle of a group of resources in Azure collectively with a group. That group is called an Azure Resource Group. This will make the management of Azure resources easier, the deployment and deletion of resources easier.

Although this concept is relatively new, I have already seen great implementations using that concept. For instance a developer created an Azure Automation runbook that will shutdown or start virtual machines that belong to a resource group that are tagged with a specific window of time in which it needs to be off …etc. You can check this out here.

There are few articles that talks about ARM and using PowerShell with ARM. I’m not going into details about that in this article. Here are few links to get you started:

• Resource groups in Azure Preview portal
• Using the Azure Preview Portal to manage your Azure resources
• Using Azure PowerShell with Azure Resource Manager

In this article, I will focus on moving resources across Azure Resource Groups. Before I get started, I like to remind you that you need to use the Preview Portal (https://Portal.Azure.com) in order to work with Resource Groups. The other option is to use PowerShell. And there too, I need to remind you that you need to make sure you have Azure PowerShell version 0.8.0 or later. You also need to switch from the regular Azure mode (Azure Service Management) to the Azure Resource Manager mode by running the following command:

PS C:\> Switch-AzureMode -Name AzureResourceManager

 You can switch back as follows:

PS C:\> Switch-AzureMode -Name AzureServiceManagement

 Now, if you haven’t created any Azure Resource Group yourself, which should be the case for all the Azure users who had Azure resources created prior the release of ARM, you will notice that Azure has created default Azure resource groups for each type of resources you have in your subscriptions. For instance, virtual networks will be grouped in a resource group “Default-Networking”.

Storage accounts will be grouped into “Default-Storage-XXXX” (XXX=Location), Web resources will be grouped into “Default-Web-XXXX” (XXX=Location), If you had cloud service item created that hosts virtual machines you will see a group with the same name as the cloud service appear … etc.

It’s important to note that all these resources created on these default ARM groups are created with Azure Service Management and some articles will refer to them as v1.0 resources or also call them classic resource. These resources has some differences with resources you can create using ARM via PowerShell. Sometimes we call these resources v2.0 resources or ARM Resources.

To summarize here are the different names for each concept:

You can read more about the differences between resources created under a resource group via ARM and resources created using Azure service management here. Here is a comparison from that article:

What I want to discuss in this article is how you can move an existing Azure resource from one resource group to another. Whether it’s a default resource group or a group you have created yourself.

I will start with few basic stuff you need to know:

You need to make sure you have downloaded an Azure PS SDK of version 0.8.0 or higher. To do that go to here and you need to switch to the ARM mode via running the following command:

PS C:\> Switch-AzureMode -Name AzureResourceManager

 And make sure you have added your azure subscription:

PS C:\> Add-AzureSubscription

 Then enter your credentials.

For more info:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn654579.aspx

If you want to get a list of all the Azure Resources in your subscription, run the following command:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource

 Notice that each resource has:

1. Name
2. Resource Id
3. Resource Name
4. Resource Type
5. Resource Group Name
6. Location
7. Subscription Id

Example of resource types are:

1. Virtual Machines
2. Domain Names
3. Virtual Networks

Also notice the resource type string in PowerShell:

• “Microsoft.ClassicCompute/VirtualMachines”
• “Microsoft.ClassicNetwork/VirtualNetworks”

The above types are all v1.0 resources or we also refer to them as classic resources as indicated above. The v2.0 types will look like this: “Microsoft.Network/VirtualNetworks”:

For example, if you want to create a new Virtual Network (v2.0) using the ARM mode, you run the following command (don’t forget to switch to ARM mode first as indicated above):

 PS C:\> New-AzureVirtualNetwork -Name FarmNetv2 
 -ResourceGroupName test -Location WestUs 
 -AddressPrefix 10.2.0.1/24

If you want to list all the existing Azure resource groups you running the following command:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResourceGroup

Now if I want to get all *Network Resources* only I can run the following command:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.ResourceType 
 -like "*Networks"}

 To get all *Virtual Machine Resources* only I can run the following command:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.ResourceType 
 -like "*Machines"}

 So you can change the where clause in the above script to fit your query needs. Now if I want to get one specific resource object (we will see later why this is useful) we can run the following query:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.Name -eq "FaragSP"}

 This assumes that your resource have a unique name across the subscription. If not you can get the resource object by Id:

 PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.ResourceId 
 -eq "/subscriptions/{XXXX}/resourceGroups/FaragSP/ 
 providers/Microsoft.ClassicCompute/virtualMachines 
 /FaragSP"}

Now we are ready to talk about how you can move resources between resource group. There is a PowerShell commandlet available on the ARM mode that will let you do just that. It is:

Move-AzureResource

So in order to move a virtual machine called “FaragSP” to a resource group called “test” we run this:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.ResourceId -eq 
 "/subscriptions/{XXXX}/resourceGroups/FaragSP/ 
 providers/Microsoft.ClassicCompute/domainNames/ 
 FaragSP"} | Move-AzureResource 
 -DestinationResourceGroupName test

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.ResourceId -eq 
 "/subscriptions/{XXXX}/resourceGroups/FaragSP/ 
 providers/Microsoft.ClassicCompute/domainNames/ 
 FaragSP"} | Move-AzureResource 
 -DestinationResourceGroupName test

"Move request contains virtual machines but not the domain names."

You will have to move the cloud service first. Here is how you can do that:

 PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.ResourceId 
 -eq "/subscriptions/{XXXX}/resourceGroups/FaragSP/ 
 providers/Microsoft.ClassicCompute/domainNames/ 
 FaragSP"} | Move-AzureResource 
 -DestinationResourceGroupName test

"The move request must contain all the virtual machines associated with the domain name 'FaragSP'. The missing virtual machines are '/subscriptions/{XXXX}/resourceGroups/FaragSP/providers/Microsoft.ClassicCompute/virtualMachines/FaragSP'"

So the right thing to do, is to move the cloud service with all its content in a single move command, you can either use PowerShell tricks to do that or simply load all resources in that cloud service including the cloud service resource itself in a collection then move them together.

In my case I have both cloud service and the only VM in it called “FaragSP” so I can select them both and do the move command on them together:

If I run the following Get-AzureResource command, I get the desired list:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.Name -eq "FaragSP"}

 So now, all I have to do is add “Pipe” then the move command:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.Name -eq "FaragSP"} 
 | Move-AzureResource -DestinationResourceGroupName test

 And this executes successfully:

Moving Virtual Networks

Now let’s try moving a VNet from one resource group to another:

PS C:\> Get-AzureResource |?{$_.Name -eq "FaragSP"} | 
 Move-AzureResource -DestinationResourceGroupName test

 This script will fail.

For a classic VNet you will get the following error:

"Resource move is not supported for 'Microsoft.ClassicNetwork'"

Or

“Bad request. Diagnostic information: timestamp”

Depending on what version of Azure SDK you have.

For ARM VNet you will get the following error:

"No HTTP resource was found that matches the request URI 'https://westus.network.azure.com:{XXXX}/130803144537698575/subscriptions/{YYYY}/resourceGroups/test/moveResources?api-version=2015-06-15'"

The reason behind this, is that it’s not supported to move Virtual Networks yet. The product group is working on adding support to that functionality soon. At the time of writing this article the commandlet Move-AzureResource will only move VMs and Storage accounts.

Workaround to move classic VNet

In order to move a classic VNet from one resource group lets say the “Default-Networking” resource group to new resource group of your choosing we can do the following:

1-      Export current Virtual Network configurations to an XML file

You can do that with the following command:

 2-      Update the Azure Resource Group names in the exported config file

Open the exported file in notepad or your favorite XML editor. You will notice that all the VNets that are assigned to the “Default-Networking” resource group don’t have anything in front of their names in the name attribute in the VirtualNetworkSite tag:

Change that to add the word “Group” then the resource group name you want to move your virtual network to as follows:

In my example above, I prepared my netcfg file to move the virtual network test from Default-Networking resource group to FaragSP resource group

If your VNet is already assigned to a resource group (other than “Default-Networking”) and you want to change the assigned resource group, just update the name after the word Group in the name attribute in the VirtualNetworkSite tag as shown above.

3-      After the netcfg file is updated with all the resource group changes required run the Set-AzureVNetConfig to submit your changes to your Azure subscription

Run the following command:

 Please note that this is only going to work if your VNet is not attached to any existing resource like VMs …etc. Otherwise you will get an error like this:

“Cannot delete or modify virtual network while in use 'SP_Network'.”

The only solution to this problem is to delete the VM that is using that VNet (keeping the VHDs) then moving the VNet to the desired resource group as explained above, and then recreating the VMs again.

Known errors and resolution

1-      “Your Azure credentials have not been set up or have expired, please run Add-AzureAccount to set up your Azure credentials.”

Run Add-AzureAccount and then enter your credentials for more info click here.

I will add more errors and resolution items soon.

I hope this article helps.

SharePoint 2013 allows you to run SharePoint Site Collections in 2010 mode. It also gives you the opportunity to create a temporary upgraded Site Collection (in 2013 mode) to see how the site will preform. We call that evolution site collection. Here are good references about the topic:

• Upgrade a site collection to SharePoint 2013
• https://blog.fpweb.net/sharepoint-2013-evaluation-site-collections/#.VMFTepUtGCo

The evaluation site collection will expire by default after 31 days. The timer job "Delete Upgrade Evaluation Site" runs daily and deletes expired eval site collections.

To increase the evolution period of an existing eval site collection run the following PowerShell command:

$site = Get-SPSite https://sp/sites/2010mode-eval 
$site.ExpirationDate = ($site.ExpirationDate).AddDays(90)

In the above code we have extended the eval site collection https://sp/sites/2010mode-eval another 3 months (90 days) 

 To confirm that the new value is applied, browse to the site collection and you should see the new expiry date at the top, or run the following PowerShell Script:

$site = Get-SPSite https://sp/sites/2010mode-eval 
$site.ExpirationDate

If you want to change the expiry date value for the new evaluation site collection you may create in the future within a certain SharePoint Web Application you can run the following PowerShell Script:

$webApp = Get-SPWebApplication https://sp 
$webApp.UpgradeEvalSitesRetentionDays 
 
$webApp.UpgradeEvalSitesRetentionDays = 300 
$webApp.Update()

Notice that we are targeting the web application https://sp and set the expiry value to 300 days.

Hope that helps.

Some times when you design your page in SharePoint whether you use the publishing framework (Pages) or just regular wiki pages (Site Pages), you want to create a link that will allow you to display and manipulate lists items in a layover dialog as oppose to move away from the current page to do that.

This can be accomplished using the SharePoint dialog framework. There are a lot of resources on MSDN and blogs that talks in details how you can use the dialog framework. Here are some:

• How to Open a List Form in a Modal Dialog Box
• How to Display a SharePoint Dialog from Ribbon Button and Get Selected Item Context
• How to: Display a Page as a Modal Dialog Box
• SharePoint 2010: Using JavaScript to Show Dialog Boxes
• Opening a SharePoint 2010 Modal Dialog Box from an InfoPath Form

I’m going to focus on how you can create links in SharePoint to display, modify or create a list item.

If you are using SharePoint 2013 you will need to use a Script Editor, Embed Code or content editor webpart.

Please note if you try to add javascript code within the HTML code of of a Wiki page (page under SitePages library) SharePoint will remove your JS code after you save your page.

The script is simple, we will create a generic function to call that will display the dialog as follows:

<script type="text/javascript">
 
 function displayLayover(url) {
 
 var options = SP.UI.$create_DialogOptions();
 
 options.url = url;
 
 options.dialogReturnValueCallback = Function.createDelegate(
 
 null, null);
 
 SP.UI.ModalDialog.showModalDialog(options);
 
 }
 
 </script>

Now you can use the created function to display a SharePoint dialog for any list. Here is an example of how you can create a link to open the display form for an item:

<a href='javascript:displayLayover("/Lists/Contacts/DispForm.aspx?ID=4&IsDlg=1")'>Display Item </a>

Here is how you display and edit form for a certain item:

<a href='javascript:displayLayover("/Lists/Contacts/EditForm.aspx?ID=4&IsDlg=1")'>Display Item </a>

 And finally this is how you create a link for displaying the new item form for a list in a dialog:

<a href='javascript:displayLayover("/Lists/Contacts/NewForm.aspx?IsDlg=1")'>Display Item </a>

Hope this helps

1. Introduction
2. Hardware requirements and sizing [Coming soon]
3. Software requirements [Coming soon]
4. Database storage requirements [Coming soon]
5. Install and configure PowerPivot & PowerView in a scale out environment
6. Known issues and workarounds --> You are here

Introduction

In this section I highlighted few known issues for PowerPivot, PowerView and related technologies like SQL Server Reporting services and Analysis services

Analysis Services and PowerPivot

Document Type is Not Supported

The PowerPivot Gallery Document content type is not supported. If you enable the PowerPivot Gallery Document content type for a document library, and attempt to create a new document of that type, you will see an error message similar to one of the following:

• ‘New Document’ requires a Microsoft Sharepoint Foundation-compatible application and web browser. To add a document to this document library, click the ‘Upload Document’ button.
• "The Internet address 'https://[server name]/testSite/PowerPivot Gallery/ReportGallery/Forms/Template.xlsx' is not valid."“Microsoft Excel cannot access the file 'https://[server name]/testSite/PowerPivot Gallery/ReportGallery/Forms/Template.xlsx'. There are several possible reasons:

The PowerPivot Gallery Document content type is not automatically added to document libraries, You will not encounter this issue unless you manually enable the unsupported content type.

 SQL Server Analysis Server (PowerPivot) Properties Page doesn’t open

Issue: If you need to update the SSAS permissions manually using the SQL Management Studio you might run into an error opening the properties page for the SSAS instance if you are running on Window 8.1 or Windows Server 2012 R2:

 Workaround: To overcome this issue download the following update from this article KB 2889492. The article also lists possible workarounds.

PowerPivot Configuration Tool Does not Create the PowerPivot Gallery

Issue: The PowerPivot Configuration Tool provisions a Team Site, and therefore the PowerPivot Gallery is not created.

Workaround: Create a new app (library).

1. Verify the site collection feature PowerPivot Feature Integration for Site Collections is active.
2. From the Site Contents page of an existing site, click add app.
3. Click PowerPivot Gallery.

To use PowerPivot for Excel with Excel 2013, you must use the add-in that is installed with Excel

Issue: With Office 2010, PowerPivot for Excel is a stand-alone add-in that is downloadable from https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/bi/powerpivot.aspx. Alternatively it can also be downloaded from the Microsoft Download Center. Note that there are two versions of the PowerPivot add-in available as a download: One that shipped with SQL Server 2008 R2 and another that shipped with SQL Server 2012. However, for Office 2013, PowerPivot for Excel ships with Office and is installed when you install Excel. While the SQL Server 2008 R2 and SQL Server 2012 versions of PowerPivot for Excel 2010 are not compatible with Excel 2013, you still can install PowerPivot for Excel 2010 on your client computer if you want to run Excel 2010 side-by-side with Excel 2013. In other words, the two versions of Excel can coexist and so can the corresponding PowerPivot add-ins.

Workaround: To use PowerPivot for Excel 2013 you must enable the COM add-in. From Excel 2013, select File | Options | Add-Ins. From the Manage drop-down box, select COM Add-ins and click Go. From COM Add-ins, select Microsoft Office PowerPivot for Excel 2013 and click Okay.

 Reporting Services and PowerView

 Install and Configure SharePoint Server 2013 Prior to Installing Reporting Services

Issue: Complete the following requirements before you install SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS).

1. Run the SharePoint 2013 Products Preparation Tool.
2. Install SharePoint Server 2013.
3. Run the SharePoint 2013 Product Configuration Wizard, or complete an equivalent set of configuration steps to configure the SharePoint farm.

Workaround: If you installed Reporting Services SharePoint mode before the SharePoint farm was configured, the required work around depends on what other components are installed. For more information on the work around, see “Required Installation Sequence” section of Install SQL Server BI Features with SharePoint 2013.

Power View in SharePoint Server 2013 Requires Microsoft.AnalysisServices.SPClient.dll

Issue: Reporting Services does not install a required component, Microsoft.AnalysisServices.SPClient.dll. If you install SharePoint Server 2013 Preview and SQL Server 2012 SP1 Reporting Services in SharePoint mode, but do not download and install the PowerPivot for SharePoint 2013 installer package, spPowerPivot.msi then Power View will not work and Power View will exhibit the following symptoms.

Symptoms: When you attempt to create a Power View report, you see an error message similar to the following:

• "Cannot create a connection to data source..."

The inner error details will contain a message similar to the following:

• "The value 'SharePoint Principal' is not supported for the connection string property 'User Identity'."

Workaround: Install the PowerPivot for SharePoint 2013 installer package (spPowerPivot.msi) on the SharePoint Server 2013. The installer package is available as part of the SQL Server 2012 SP1 feature pack. The feature pack can be downloaded from the Microsoft download center at SQL Server 2012 SP1 Feature Pack

Power View sheets in a PowerPivot workbook are deleted after a scheduled data refresh

Issue: In the PowerPivot add-in for SharePoint, using Scheduled Data Refresh on a workbook with Power View will delete any Power View sheets.

Workaround: To use Scheduled Data Refresh with Power View workbooks, create a PowerPivot workbook that is just the data model. Create a separate workbook with your Excel sheets and Power View sheets that links to the PowerPivot workbook with the data model. Only the PowerPivot workbook with the data model should be scheduled for data refresh.

Refresh All in excel service 2013 failed because web application has Kerberos authentication

Issue: You get an error when you hit refresh all in an excel workbook with external data connection for a SharePoint web application that is configured to use Kerberos

Resolution:

The Claims to Windows Token Service (C2WTS) is a component of the Windows Identity Foundation (WIF) which is responsible for converting user claim tokens to windows tokens. Excel services uses the C2WTS to convert the user’s claims token into a windows token when the services needs to delegate credentials to a back-end system which uses Integrated Windows authentication. WIF is deployed with SharePoint Server 2010 and the C2WTS can be started from Central Administration.

Each SharePoint service application must run the C2WTS locally. The C2WTS does not open any ports and cannot be accessed by a remote caller. Further, the C2WTS service configuration file must be configured to specifically trust the local calling client identity. 

As a best practice you should run the C2WTS using a dedicated service account and not as Local System (the default configuration). But Local System will work if you configure the Kerberos constrained delegation to use the machine name account. The C2WTS service account requires special local permissions on each server the service runs on so be sure to configure these permissions each time the service is started on a server. Optimally you should configure the service account’s permissions on the local server before starting the C2WTS, but if done after the fact you can restart the C2WTS from the Windows services management console (services.msc). 

To start the C2WTS using Domain Account

1. Create a service account in Active Directory to run the service under. In this example, we have created 'vmlab\svcC2WTS'. 

2. Add an arbitrary Service Principal Name (SPN) to the service account to expose the delegation options for this account in Active Directory Users and 
 Computers. The SPN can be any format because we do not authenticate to the C2WTS using Kerberos authentication. It is recommended to not use an HTTP SPN to avoid potentially creating duplicate SPNs in your environment. In our example, we have registered 'SP/C2WTS' to the 'vmlab\svcC2WTS' using thefollowing command:

Collapse this tableExpand this table

3. Configure Kerberos constrained delegation on the C2WTS services account. In his scenario we will delegate credentials to the SQL service running with the 'MSSQLSVC/MySqlCluster.vmlab.local:1433' service principal name.

Key configuration options on the delegation tab are the following (screenshot below):

a) Select “Trust this user for delegation to specified services only"

b) Select “Use any authentication protocol”

External data refresh failed error for PowerPivot\Excel Services

Issue: You get the following error:

An error occurred while working on the Data Model in the workbook. Please try again. We are unable to refresh one or more data connections in this workbook.

Depending on what data provider you are using for your external data connection you will get a different error:

For SQL Native Client:

Failed to create an external connection or execute a query. Provider message: Out of line object 'DataSource', referring to ID(s) '20102481-39c8-4d21-bf63-68f583ad22bb', has been specified but has not been used.  OLE DB or ODBC error: A network-related or instance-specific error has occurred while establishing a connection to SQL Server. Server is not found or not accessible. Check if instance name is correct and if SQL Server is configured to allow remote connections. For more information see SQL Server Books Online.; 08001; SSL Provider: The requested security package does not exist ; 08001; Client unable to establish connection; 08001; Encryption not supported on the client.; 08001.  , ConnectionName: ThisWorkbookDataModel, Workbook: book1.xlsx.

For Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server:

Failed to create an external connection or execute a query. Provider message: Out of line object 'DataSource', referring to ID(s) '6e711bfa-b62f-4879-a177-c5dd61d9c242', has been specified but has not been used. OLE DB or ODBC error. , ConnectionName: ThisWorkbookDataModel, Workbook: OLEDB Provider.xlsx.

For .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server:

Failed to create an external connection or execute a query. Provider message: Out of line object 'DataSource', referring to ID(s) 'f5fb916c-3eac-4d07-a542-531524c0d44a', has been specified but has not been used.  Errors in the high-level relational engine. The following exception occurred while the managed IDbConnection interface was being used: Could not load file or assembly 'System.Transactions, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089' or one of its dependencies. Either a required impersonation level was not provided, or the provided impersonation level is invalid. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80070542).  , ConnectionName: ThisWorkbookDataModel, Workbook: NETProvider.xlsx.

Resolution: Configure Analysis Services Server in SharePoint mode service account to “Act as operating system” as follows:

1. On the Analysis Services Server running in SharePoint mode, Add the Analysis Services service account to the "Act as part of the operating system" privilege:

a. Run “secpol.msc”

b. Click Local Security Policy, then click Local policies, and then click User rights assignment.

c. Add the service account.

2. Restart Excel Services and reboot the Analysis Services server.

3. Delegation from the Excel Services service account or from Claims to Windows token service (C2WTS) to the Analysis services instance is not required. Therefore no configuration for KCD from Excel Services or C2WTS to PowerPivot AS service is necessary. Note: If the backend data source is on the same server as the Analysis Services instance, delegation is not required.

For more information, see Act as part of the operating system

Resources

• Install SQL Server BI Features with SharePoint 2013 (SQL Server 2012 SP1)
• Microsoft SQL Server PowerPivot Planning and Deployment
• Plan a PowerPivot Deployment in a SharePoint Farm
• Software requirements for business intelligence in SharePoint Server 2013
• Hardware and Software Requirements (PowerPivot for SharePoint and Reporting Services in SharePoint Mode)
• Plan for PowerPivot Integration with Excel Services
• Hardware and Software Requirements for Analysis Services Server in SharePoint Mode (SQL Server 2012 SP1)
• Hardware and software requirements for SharePoint 2013
• Configure PowerPivot Service Accounts
• Create Your First PowerPivot Workbook (Tutorial)
• How to configure Claim to Windows Token Services in SharePoint 2010 with Kerberos Authentication
• PowerPivot Data Refresh with SharePoint 2013
• Power View Infrastructure Configuration and Installation: Step-by-Step and Scripts (SP 2010)
• CheckList: Use PowerShell to Verify PowerPivot for SharePoint

1. Introduction
2. Hardware requirements and sizing [Coming soon]
3. Software requirements [Coming soon]
4. Database storage requirements [Coming soon]
5. Install and configure PowerPivot & PowerView in a scale out environment  --> You are here
6. Known issues and workarounds

Important Acronyms

Introduction

In this section we highlight the steps for deploying and configuring PowerPivot for SharePoint 2013 for a scale-out environment. It will also explain the service accounts requirements for PowerPivot

This is part of a series of articles about PowerView and PowerPivot. To understand the server architecture and product versions we are targeting in this article please refer to the main article HERE.

Configuring Service Accounts for PowerPivot

To deploy and configure SQL Server Analysis Services for PowerPivot you need to configure two accounts:

1. SSAS (PowerPivot) Service Account. Should be a domain account which will be used to run the SSAS (PowerPivot) windows service.
2. PowerPivot Service Application app pool account

SharePoint and SSAS configuration wizard\PS scripts will take care of granting the required permissions on SQL Dbs as appropriate. Once the service accounts are set, any changes to either account must be made through SharePoint Central Administration. If you use alternative tools (such as the Services console application, IIS Manager, or SQL Server Configuration Manager), permissions will not be updated for database access in the farm or for local file access on the physical server. There is one exception to the SSAS (PowerPivot) windows service accounts if they reside in standalone servers (No SharePoint bits) you need to update the service accounts from the servers directly not via SharePoint.

Analysis Services for PowerPivot Service Account requirements

 PowerPivot Service Application App Pool Requirements

 Few notes before you deploy PowerPivot

• You can use a local Secure Store Service or connect to a remote Secure Store Service. If you choose to connect to a remote Secure Store Service the configuration wizard of PowerPivot will not work properly. So you would have to use the generated PowerShell script to configure PowerPivot instead. We show you how to do that later in the article.
• The steps in this document assumes knowledge of SharePoint. It also expect that you have installed and configured your SharePoint 2013 farm including a SQL Server engine to host SharePoint databases.
• In this article we are going to deploy SQL Server Analysis Services for PowerPivot on dedicated servers outside the SharePoint farm.

Steps to deploy PowerPivot

A- Get SharePoint farm Ready

1. Create or Connect to Secure Store Service
2. Start Secure Store Service on the App boxes in your farm
3. Make sure that the Secure Store Service has an encryption key created
4. Create Excel Services Service Application (if its not created yet). Has to be local in the same farm, so it cannot be hosted on a remote farm.
5. Start Excel Services on App Servers
6. Start the Claims to Windows Token Service (c2WTS) on all app servers.
7. Increase the maximum size of allowed workbook (default is 10 MB) Max is 2000:
8. Manage Service Application | Excel Services Application | Trusted File Location | (SELECT DESIRED LOCATION) à Change maximum workbook size:
9.  
10. ** You might also need to increase the maximum upload limit for your Web applications (default is 250MB) if you are going to use large workbooks.
11. Application Management | Manage Web Applications | (SELECT DESIRED APPLICATION) à click General Settings on the ribbon à Change “Maximum upload size”
12. Configure an unattended account for Excel Services
13. Install SQL Client tools (OLE DB Provider) on all App Servers running Excel Services. Read this: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee210608.aspx
14. Install ADOMD.NET for SQL Server 2012 on WFE that hosts CA

B- Install SQL Server Analysis Services for PowerPivot (SQL App servers)

1. Install SQL Server PowerPivot for SharePoint without SQL Engine on BI App Servers

- Uncheck the step that creates a database engine as its not required in a multitier deployment where we have a dedicated SQL Engine for all the SharePoint databases

- Make sure you add the account that runs the excel services to be granted “admin” privileges on the SSAS (PowerPivot) instance. All service applications that require access to the Analysis Services server instance need to have Analysis Services Administrative permissions. For example, add the service accounts for Excel Services, Power View, and Performance Point Services. Also, add the SharePoint farm account, which is used as the identity of the web application that hosts Central Administration.

If you missed that step you can do it manually using the properties page of the SSAS (PowerPivot) instance in the SQL Management Studio, refer to the details at the end

- Make sure you specify a location for the SSAS files storage especially the “Backup Directory” as this folder is expected to have high storage requirements.

You can change these settings after the installation is completed by connecting to the PowerPivot instance and going to the properties page:

2. Download and install spPowerPivot.msi for MS SQL Server 2012 SP1 on all App Servers that will run the PowerPivot Service application. Its recommended to install is on All SharePoint servers in case you decided to host Excel Services and PowerPivot services on different servers than the apps servers. It will also avoid any complaints from PSConfig (SharePoint Configuration Wizard) when ran for applying patches and updates.

3. Configure SSAS using “PowerPivot for SharePoint 2013 Configuration” application installed in the step above by running the “PowerPivot Configuration for SharePoint 2013” from the start menu not the “PowerPivot Configuration tool” as the last one is for SharePoint 2010. It’s important to note that using the configuration tool you can generate PowerShell script that allows you to automate and control the configuration process (like db names …etc.)

First time you run the configuration tool on one of the BI App boxes you will go through all the configuration steps starting with registering the box to host a PowerPivot instance up to creating the PowerPivot Service Application. If you have more than one server that will host the PowerPivot Service Application (recommended for redundancy) you can also run the config tool to add the server to the list of the servers that will host the PowerPivot Service application or you can run the following script:

# Open PowerShell library from: C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\110\Tools\PowerPivotTools\SPAddinConfiguration\Resources\ConfigurePowerPivot.ps1 
 
 New-PowerPivotSystemServiceInstance -Provision:$true

You can automate the SSAS for PowerPivot process using the following script:

SETUP.EXE /Q /IACCEPTSQLSERVERLICENSETERMS /ACTION=install /ROLE=SPI_AS_ExistingFarm /INSTANCENAME=POWERPIVOT /ASSVCACCOUNT="BI\BISERVICE" /ASSVCPASSWORD="pass@word1" /ASSYSADMINACCOUNTS="BI\BIAdmin" /PID xxx-xxxx-xxxx

Once the configuration is completed successfully you should see the following:

• SQL Server PowerPivot System Service started on all the app servers you configured SSAS (PowerPivot) at.
• The PowerPivot Service application created
• The PowerPivot Service application database created
• The PowerPivot Service Unattended account created and registered in the Secure Store Service
• The Excel Service Application is created (if it wasn’t already created) and configured to work with PowerPivot

4. Open ports for SSAS and SQL Browser Service on the BI App Servers:

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms174937(v=sql.110).aspx

Run the following in an elevated command prompt:

netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name="SQL-2383" dir=in action=allow protocol=TCP localport=2383

5. Add all SSAS BI App servers in the excel services Application Data Model Settings with the following format:

 SERVER_NAME\POWERPIVOT

Manage Service Applications | Excel Service Application | Data Model Settings

The changes will take effect in a few minutes or you can Stop and Start the service Excel Calculation Services.

Another option is to open a command prompt with administrative privileges, and type iisreset /noforce.

You can verify the server is recognized by Excel Services by reviewing entries in the ULS log. You will see entries similar to the following:

 Repeat all the steps on section B to install and configure all your SQL Server Analysis Services servers for PowerPivot.

Steps to verify that PowerPivot is configured correctly

Note: If you already have an advanced workbook with slicers or filters, you can upload it to your SharePoint document library and verify you are able to interact with the slicers and filters from the document library view.

To verify that the SSAS for PowerPivot is running, RDP to the SSAS servers and run the following PowerShell command:

get-service | select name, displayname, status | where {$_.Name -eq "msolap`$powerpivot"} | format-table -property * -autosize | out-default

You should get something like this:

Verify that the PowerPivot Service application existing and started. To do that run the following PowerShell command (in a SharePoint PowerShell Command window):

Get-PowerPivotSystemService | select typename, status, applications, farm | format-table -property * -autosize | out-default

You should see a similar result to the folowing:

For more verification steps go to: CheckList: Use PowerShell to Verify PowerPivot for SharePoint

Steps to test PowerPivot for SharePoint

1. Start a new workbook in Excel.
2. On the Data tab, click From Other Sources on the ribbon in the Get External Data.
3. Select From SQL Server.
4. In the Data Connection Wizard, enter the name of the SQL Server instance that has the database you want to use.
5. Enter the database instance Log on credentials, and then click Next.
6. Select the database you want to use.
7. Verify that the Connect to specific table checkbox is selected.
8. Click the Enable selection of multiple tables and add tables to the Excel Data Model checkbox.
9. Select the tables you want to import.
10. Click the checkbox Import relationships between selected tables, and then click Next. Importing multiple tables from a relational database lets you work with tables that are already related. You save steps because you don't have to build the relationships manually.
11. In the Save Data Connection File and Finish page of the wizard, type a name for your connection and click Finish.
12. The Import Data dialog box will appear. Choose PivotTable Report, and then click Ok.
13. A PivotTable Field List appears in the workbook. On the field list, click All tab
14. Add fields to the Row, Columns, and Value areas in the field list.
15. Add a slicer or a filter to the PivotTable. Do not skip this step. A slicer or filter is the element that will help you verify your Analysis Services installation.
16. Save the workbook to a document library on a SharePoint Server 2013 that has Excel Services configured. You can also save the workbook to a file share and then upload it to the SharePoint Server 2013 document library.
17. Click the name of your workbook to view it in SharePoint and click the slicer or change the filter that you previously added. If a data update occurs, you know that Analysis Services is installed and available to Excel Services. If you open the workbook in Excel you will be using a cached copy and not using the Analysis Services server.

Steps to install and configure PowerView

1. Install SSRS for SharePoint (Requires about 1.2 GB of disk space)

You need to install SQL Server Reporting Services for SharePoint 2013 to be able to use and display PowerView reports (Create\Open RDLX files).

If you only install the SSRS add-in without the SSRS for SharePoint 2013 itself you will see the icon that enables you to create “PowerView” appeared in the PowerPivot gallery:

but when you click on it, you will get the following error:

Here are the steps to install SQL Server Reporting Services for SharePoint 2013:

The following steps needs to be done on all SharePoint App servers

- Run the SQL Server 2012 SP1 Setup media and choose “Reporting Services – SharePoint”

- Create SQL Server Reporting Services Application

You can achieve this using the following script:

 Install-SPRSService 
 
 Install-SPRSServiceProxy 
 
 $appPoolName = "SharePoint Web Services System" 
 
 $serviceAppName = "Reporting Web Service" 
 
 $serviceAppProxyName = $serviceAppName + " Proxy" 
 
 $appPool = get-spserviceapplicationpool $appPoolName 
 
 $serviceApp = New-SPRSServiceApplication $serviceAppName -applicationpool $appPool 
 
 $serviceAppProxy = New-SPRSServiceApplicationProxy -name $serviceAppProxyName -serviceapplication $serviceApp 
 
 get-spserviceapplicationproxygroup -default | Add-SPServiceApplicationProxyGroupMember -Member $serviceAppProxy 
 
 $serviceApp.ServiceInstances | Start-SPServiceInstance 
 

If you have an existing instance of SQL Server Reporting Services and you want to make sure its started on the app servers, run the following PowerShell command on the designated app servers:

get-spserviceinstance -all |where {$_.TypeName -like "SQL Server Reporting*"} | Start-SPServiceInstance

2. Install SSRS Add-in for SharePoint.

Check the supported combination of SharePoint version, SQL Server version and add-in version here … If you don’t pick the right version of the add-in it will fail in the installation. Remember not all add-ins supports all versions of Windows Servers.

Here is the supported combinations that works with SharePoint 2013

(rsSharePoint.msi) on All WFEs Servers from here

If you are getting and error during the installation of the add-in, make sure you run the configuration wizard for SharePoint and it runs successfully.

After your are done you should be ready to use PowerView

References

• Install SQL Server BI Features with SharePoint 2013 (SQL Server 2012 SP1)
• Microsoft SQL Server PowerPivot Planning and Deployment
• Plan a PowerPivot Deployment in a SharePoint Farm
• Software requirements for business intelligence in SharePoint Server 2013
• Hardware and Software Requirements (PowerPivot for SharePoint and Reporting Services in SharePoint Mode)
• Plan for PowerPivot Integration with Excel Services
• Hardware and Software Requirements for Analysis Services Server in SharePoint Mode (SQL Server 2012 SP1)
• Hardware and software requirements for SharePoint 2013
• Configure PowerPivot Service Accounts
• Create Your First PowerPivot Workbook (Tutorial)
• How to configure Claim to Windows Token Services in SharePoint 2010 with Kerberos Authentication
• PowerPivot Data Refresh with SharePoint 2013
• Power View Infrastructure Configuration and Installation: Step-by-Step and Scripts (SP 2010)
• CheckList: Use PowerShell to Verify PowerPivot for SharePoint

Products versions

Since there are a lot of Microsoft products involved in this setup, I thought it would be helpful to determine which versions of these products I wrote my article about:

• Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013
• Microsoft SQL Server 2012
• Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services 2012
• Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2012
• Windows Server 2012

Server architecture

To achieve the minimum level of high availability you need to have at least two servers under each role. We have 4 different roles:

1. Web Application Role: SharePoint web application servers (aka WFE)
2. Application Server Role: SharePoint application servers (aka App Servers)
3. BI Application Server Role: SQL Server Analysis Services for PowerPivot servers
4. Database Role: SQL Database servers 

This is the first article of a series I'm writing that covers different aspects of the topic:

1. Introduction --> You are here
2. Hardware requirements and sizing [Coming soon]
3. Software requirements [Coming soon]
4. Database storage requirements [Coming soon]
5. Install and configure PowerPivot & PowerView in a scale out environment
6. Known issues and workarounds

1- To get your TFS build server ready for building SP apps:

How to Build Office Developer Tools Projects with TFS Team Build 2012

2- Download the deployment and build process templates from codeplex. Use the PowerShell script ‘TfsBuildServerPrerequisites.ps1’ to prepare your build server. It has an option to collect required files for you, then install everything for you.

After everything is setup correctly and you have queued your first build but got errors, here are few things that can help:

1- Getting the following error: “Only one project can be specified”

Resolution: Make sure that your build definition name doesn’t have any spaces

2- Getting the following error: “Import-Module: The specified module ‘Microsoft.Online.SharePoint.PowerShell’ was not loaded because no valid module

Resolution: Make sure that you have installed the ‘Microsoft SharePoint Online Management Shell’. If you haven’t go to this link to download it and install it. After it’s installed you need to restart the TFS build services so the PowerShell modules become visible to TFS, go to services.msc and restart the following services:

• Visual Studio Team Foundation Build Service Host 201X
• Visual Studio Team Foundation Background Job Agent

That’s all for now. Let me know if you can across other know issues to share with the crowd. Thanks.

One of the apps that shows up out of the box is the “Access App”:

If you haven’t configured access services yet in your farm or don’t want users to create new Access Apps you can remove this tile from the list of apps that you can add. In order to do this you need to disable a hidden feature called “AccSvcAddAccessApp”:

To do that you need to run the following PowerShell command:

Disable-SPFeature -Url https://SITE_URL -Identity d2b9ec23-526b-42c5-87b6-852bd83e0364

https://SITE_URL --> Is the URL of the SharePoint Site where you want to remove “Access App” from.