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Create a PWA site in a Project Server 2010 test environment

 

Applies to: Project Server 2010

Topic Last Modified: 2011-08-05

(This article is part 8 of the Microsoft Project Server 2010 test environment deployment series. The procedures in this article assume that you have read the series in sequence starting with Hyper-V quick start for creating a Project Server 2010 test environment.)

In order to use Project Server 2010, you must create a Microsoft Project Web App (PWA) site. Log on to Litware-Proj using the Litware\FarmAdmin account, and perform the following procedures to create a PWA site.

Creating a PWA site takes five basic steps:

  1. Temporarily lock down existing content databases.

  2. Create a content database to host the PWA site and its associated project workspaces.

  3. Create the PWA site itself.

  4. Lock down the PWA content database to prevent additional site collections being added.

  5. Unlock existing content databases.

Video demonstration

This video shows the steps involved in creating a PWA site and configuring time reporting periods and the workflow proxy account.

Screenshot of video

Watch the video (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkId=196725). To download the video file, right-click the link, and then click Save Target As.

Create a PWA site

SharePoint Server 2010 uses a round-robin algorithm to determine the distribution of site collections across content databases. In order to deploy the PWA site to a specific content database, you must lock down any existing content databases in the farm. The process does not affect user access; it only affects the distribution of new site collections.

To lock down your content databases, follow these steps.

Important

Ensure that no other administrators are adding site collections to the Web application where you plan to deploy PWA while you are performing the procedures in this section.

To lock down a content database

  1. In the SharePoint Central Administration Web site, in the Application Management section, click Manage content databases.

  2. In the Current Number of Site Collections column, note the number of site collections for the WSS_Content database (this should be 1).

  3. In the Database Name column, click the link for the WSS_Content database.

  4. In the Database Capacity Settings section:

    1. In the Maximum number of sites that can be created in this database box, type the existing number of site collections for this database (as noted in the Current Number of Site Collections column, earlier in this procedure).

    2. In the Number of sites before a Warning event is generated box, type a lower number than the value that is used for Maximum number of sites that can be created in this database.

  5. Click OK.

To create a content database

  1. In SharePoint Central Administration, in the Application Management section, click Manage content databases.

  2. Click Add a content database.

  3. In the Database Name section, type PWA_Content.

  4. Click OK.

Once the content database has been created and configured, the next step is to create the PWA site itself.

To create a PWA site

  1. In the SharePoint Central Administration Web site, in the Application Management section, click Manage service applications.

  2. On the Manage Service Applications page, click the Project Server Service Application.

  3. On the Manage Project Web App Sites page, click Create Project Web App Site.

  4. Keep the default values, and then click OK.

Project Server 2010 starts the PWA site creation process. This may take some time. When the site creation process is complete, the status shown on the PWA site list is Provisioned.

Once the PWA site is provisioned, you can access it using the URL http://litware-proj/pwa.

Once the PWA site has been provisioned, verify that it was created in the PWA_Content database. Use the Get-SPSite Windows PowerShell command, passing the new content database as a parameter:

To verify the PWA site location

  1. On the Start menu, click All Programs.

  2. Click Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Products.

  3. Click SharePoint 2010 Management Shell.

  4. From the Windows PowerShell command prompt (that is, PS C:\>), type the following command and then press ENTER:

    Get-SPSite -ContentDatabase <ContentDatabaseName>

    The command should return the URL for your PWA site and no other URLs.

Once the PWA site is in the PWA_Content database, you must lock down the database to prevent SharePoint Server 2010 from adding additional site collections to the database. This is performed by configuring the maximum number of sites for the content database to one.

Note

Configuring this setting does not prevent new project workspace sites from being created.

To lock down the content database

  1. In SharePoint Central Administration, in the Application Management section, click Manage content databases.

  2. In the Database Name column, click the link for the PWA_Content database.

  3. In the Database Capacity Settings section:

    1. In the Number of sites before a Warning event is generated box, type 0.

    2. In the Maximum number of sites that can be created in this database box, type 1.

  4. Click OK.

Once you have locked down your PWA content database, you can return the WSS_Content database to its original values for Maximum number of sites that can be created in this database (15000) and Number of sites before a Warning event is generated (9000).

You can now access the new PWA site.

Configuring server settings

Each time that you create a PWA site, there are two additional configuration steps that you must take before you start to use Project Server 2010:

  • Create time reporting periods

  • Set the workflow proxy user account

Configuring time reporting periods is required for Team Member use of Time Tracking and Task Statusing within Project Server 2010. Use the following procedure to create time reporting periods.

To create time reporting periods

  1. On the Project Web App site, click Server Settings.

  2. In the Time and Task Management section, click Time Reporting Periods.

  3. On the Time Reporting Periods page:

    1. Click the calendar button next to Date the first period starts and select a start date for the first time reporting period.

      Important

      If you choose a length of seven days for a standard reporting period, all periods will begin on the day of the week you select for the first period start date. Choose a day of the week that conforms with the needs of your organization.

      Important

      If you want to create variable-length periods, for example when you are using a period per calendar month, you must do these individually on the Time Reporting Periods page or programmatically through custom code.

    2. Click Create Bulk.

    3. Click Save.

The final step before you start to use the Project Web App site is to set the workflow proxy user account. By default, this account is set to the account that you used to create the PWA site. Although you can keep the default, we recommend that you use an account that was created for that purpose. In this case, we will use the Litware\WFProxy account. Note that you must change the account before you start any workflows or else in-progress workflows will break.

There are two steps that you must follow to set up the workflow proxy account:

  • Create a Project Server 2010 user account for the Litware\WFProxy account

  • Configure the Litware\WFProxy account as the workflow proxy user

Perform the following procedure to create a Project Server 2010 for the Litware\WFProxy account.

To create a user

  1. In Project Web App, click Server Settings.

  2. In the Security section, click Manage Users.

  3. On the Manage Users page, click New User.

  4. On the New User page:

    1. Clear the User can be assigned as a resource check box.

    2. In the Display Name box, type Workflow Proxy User.

    3. In the User Authentication section, type Litware\WFProxy in the User logon account box.

    4. Select the Prevent Active Directory synchronization for this user check box.

    5. In the Security Categories area, select My Organization in Available Categories, and then click Add.

    6. Under Permissions for My Organization, select Allow for the following permissions:

      • Open Project

      • Save Project to Project Server

      • View Enterprise Resource Data

    7. Under Global Permissions, select Allow for the following permissions:

      • Log On

      • Manage Users and Groups

      • Manage Workflow and Project Detail Pages

  5. Click Save.

Once the user account is created, you can set the workflow proxy user account. Perform the following procedure to configure the workflow proxy user account.

To set the workflow proxy user account

  1. In PWA, click Server Settings.

  2. On the Server Settings page, under Workflow and Project Detail Pages, click Project Workflow Settings.

  3. On the Project Workflow Settings page, in the Workflow Proxy User account box, type Litware\WFProxy, and then click Save.

You are now ready to start using the Project Web App site. The next step is to configure reporting to enable the Project Server reporting and business intelligence features. Proceed to the next article, Configure reporting for a Project Server 2010 test environment.