On-premises SharePoint farm configuration: A troubleshooting guide

This document provides a list of common error messages you might face when configuring your on-premises SharePoint farm—along with solutions to fix the issues. Click an error message to navigate to its solution.

Below is the list of errors you may face when configuring a farm in SharePoint Manager Plus.

1. CredSSP and WinRM authentication errors
   • The authentication mechanism requested by the client is not supported by the server
   • Unencrypted traffic is disabled in the service configuration
2. Connecting to SharePoint Server ABC.domain.com failed with the following error message: The WinRM client received an HTTP server error status (500), but the remote service did not include any other information about the cause of the failure
3. Access is denied
4. Remote/Local PowerShell Settings required.
5. Cannot access the local farm
6. PowerShell Version is less than 2
7. Authentication and request errors
   • The request is not supported error
   • An authentication error has occurred
   • The function requested is not supported
   • The token supplied to the function is invalid
8. Microsoft SharePoint is not supported with version 4.0.30319.33440 of the Microsoft .Net Runtime

1. CredSSP and WinRM authentication errors

• The authentication mechanism requested by the client is not supported by the server
• Unencrypted traffic is disabled in the service configuration

Possible reason

CredSSP authentication is not enabled on the client or server, causing the authentication request to get rejected.

Solution

Enable the CredSSP setting on both the client and server:

• Open the Group Policy settings on the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed and navigate to Computer Policy > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Remote Management (WinRM) > WinRM Client. Set Allow CredSSP authentication to Enabled.
• Open the Group Policy settings in SharePoint Server and navigate to Computer Policy > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Remote Management (WinRM) > WinRM Service. Set Allow CredSSP authentication to Enabled.

2. Connecting to SharePoint Server ABC.domain.com failed with the following error message : The WinRM client received an HTTP server error status (500), but the remote service did not include any other information about the cause of the failure

Possible reason

The WinRM service is not configured with a valid WinRM certificate, causing authentication to fail when attempting to connect to the SharePoint server.

Solution

• Open Event Viewer and navigate to Windows Logs > System.
• Locate the event with Windows Remote Management as the Source and Error as the Level.
• Open this event to find the error.
• If the error contains "Use the thumbprint of a valid certificate," run the following command in PowerShell as an administrator:
  Set-Item WSMan:\localhost\Service\CertificateThumbprint -Value ''

3. Access is denied

Possible reasons

• The user account doesn't have farm admin privileges.
• The username or password is not valid.

Solutions

• Ensure the user account has all the necessary privileges mentioned on this page.
• Make sure that the user account's credentials are correct.

4. Remote/Local PowerShell Settings required

Possible reasons

• Either the local or remote PowerShell configuration was not done properly.
• SharePoint Server has no trust with the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed.

Solutions

• Enable remote PowerShell on both the machine where SharePoint Server is installed and the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed:
  • On the machine where SharePoint Server is installed, open PowerShell as an administrator and run the commands below:

    Enable-PSRemoting -Force

    Enable-WSManCredSSP -Role Server -Force

  • On the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed, open PowerShell as an administrator and run the commands below:

    Enable-PSRemoting -Force

    Enable-WSManCredSSP -Role Client -DelegateComputer "server.domain.com" (Fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of SharePoint Server)

• If the machines where SharePoint Server and SharePoint Manager Plus are installed reside in different domains, run the following commands on the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed:

  Enable-PSRemoting -Force

  Set-Item WSMan:\localhost\Client\TrustedHosts -Value "server.domain.com" (FQDN of SharePoint Server) -Concatenate -Force

  Restart-Service WinRM

  If the error persists, you can try the following:

  • Check your Group Policy settings on this page.
  • Run the following commands to increase the maximum memory allocated per shell; the recommended size is 1,024MB:

    Get-Item wsman:\localhost\shell\MaxMemoryPerShellMB (Run this to check the current PowerShell memory size)

    Set-Item wsman:\localhost\shell\MaxMemoryPerShellMB -Value 1024 -Force (Run this only if the memory is less than 1,024MB)

    Restart-Service WinRM

  • Run the following commands to increase the maximum concurrent shells allowed per user; the recommended count is 30:

    Get-Item wsman:\localhost\shell\MaxShellsPerUser (Run this to check the maximum concurrent shells allowed per user)

    Set-Item wsman:\localhost\shell\MaxShellsPerUser -Value 30 -Force (Run this only if the count is less than 30)

    Restart-Service WinRM

5. Cannot access the local farm

Possible reasons

1. The user account might not have all the privileges needed for a farm administrator.
2. The authentication currently used may not be supported by SharePoint Server. It may not delegate the user to another machine to access the database server.

Solutions

• Check all the required farm admin privileges and configure them accordingly.
• Ensure the user has access to the configuration database and all content databases, granted through the SQL Server SharePoint_Shell_Access database role. To assign this role to the user through PowerShell, open PowerShell on your remote machine and run the following commands:

  Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell

  Get-SPDatabase | Add-SPShellAdmin DOMAIN\UserName [Replace DOMAIN\UserName with the actual user account]

  Alternatively, you can do this by opening SQL Server Management Studio and assigning the DBCREATOR, SECURITYADMIN, and SYSADMIN server roles to the user. Also, ensure that the user has the DBOWNER privilege over all the SharePoint databases.

• If the error persists, you can try the following:
  • Click here to check the Group Policy settings.
  • If the machines where SharePoint Server and SharePoint Manager Plus are installed reside in different domains, run the following commands on the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed:

    Enable-PSRemoting -Force

    Set-Item WsMan:\localhost\client\trustedhosts -Value "server.domain.com" [FQDN of SharePoint Server] -Concatenate -Force

    Restart-Service WinRM

• Enabling CredSSP authentication on the machines where SharePoint Server and SharePoint Manager Plus are installed could also solve the issue:
  • On the machine where SharePoint Server is installed, open PowerShell as an administrator and run the following commands:

    Enable-PSRemoting -Force

    Enable-WSManCredSSP -Role Server -Force

  • On the machine where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed, open PowerShell as an administrator and run the following commands:

    Enable-PSRemoting -ForceEnable-WSManCredSSP -Role Client -DelegateComputer "server.domain.com" [FQDN of SharePoint Server] -Force

6. PowerShell Version is less than 2

Possible reason

The installed PowerShell version is outdated and does not meet the minimum requirement for SharePoint Manager Plus.

Solution

SharePoint Manager Plus requires PowerShell version 2 and above to work. Upgrade to at least PowerShell version 2.

7. Authentication and request errors

• The request is not supported error
• An authentication error has occurred
• The function requested is not supported
• The token supplied to the function is invalid

Possible reason

You may encounter these errors when attempting to connect using Remote Desktop Connection or when establishing a remote PowerShell connection. SharePoint Manager Plus uses CredSSP authentication to connect to SharePoint Server. A remote code execution vulnerability exists in the CredSSP protocol; this vulnerability (CVE-2018-0886) was addressed by a Microsoft security update. Both the client and the server need to be updated to resolve this.

Solution

Install the Microsoft security update on both the client and the SharePoint server.

8. Microsoft SharePoint in not supported with version 4.0.30319.33440 of the Microsoft .Net Runtime

Possible reason

This issue arises because the current .NET Runtime version is not compatible with Microsoft SharePoint's requirements. The default PowerShell version on most modern systems might be incompatible, thus causing the error.

Solution

Perform the following steps to create a custom PowerShell session configuration. The command below registers a PowerShell 2.0 session, ensuring SharePoint cmdlets run in a environment compatible with older .NET versions:

• Open PowerShell as an administrator on the machine where SharePoint Server is installed and run the following command:
  Register-PSSessionConfiguration -PSVersion 2.0 -Name ps2
• Open the location where SharePoint Manager Plus is installed and navigate to the ManageEngine\SharePoint Manager Plus\bin folder.
• Open Command Prompt as an administrator at this location and run connectDb.bat.
• Run the following command:
  Update ParamValueRelation set VALUE='ps2' where PARAM='PS_CONFIG_DEFAULT';

These steps will configure SharePoint Manager Plus to use the newly created session (ps2) for executing PowerShell commands, ensuring compatibility with Microsoft SharePoint.