1. Determine the SharePoint service account that you want to use as the identity for the Claims to Windows Token Service.
1. This service account should be a domain account with standard user privileges. 

   For my environments, I generally use the services account (eg, spService) as the identity for C2WTS.

2. If your environment is locked down, ensure that the network GPO is modified to grant the service account the Impersonate a client after authentication and Log on as a service local user rights assignments.
3. Using the SharePoint Setup/Administrator account (eg, spadmin), launch Central Administration, and then navigate to Security > Configure service accounts.
4. From the upper dropdown, select Windows Service - Claims to Windows Token Service.
5. From the lower dropdown, select the desired service account.
6. Click OK.
7. Check the Events log on the server on which the service is started to ensure that this account re-assignment did not generate any errors.

1. Claims to Windows Token Service (c2WTS)
2. c2wts - Windows Service account SharePoint Server 2010
3. Built-in accounts are used as application pool or service identities (SharePoint Foundation 2010)
4. How to configure the Claims to Windows Token Service (C2WTS) for SharePoint 2013
5. Local Policy Settings

• Remarkably, the SharePoint 2013 Health Analyzer rules reference does not include an entry for this issue, though the 2010 rules reference does.  A link to the appropriate rule reference for this issue is provided in the References section.
• Reference 4 indicates that the C2WTS service account should have the Act as part of the operating system user right assignment in local policy.  However, in its Local Policy Settings reference, Microsoft states that,

  This user right is extremely powerful; anyone with this right can take complete control of the computer and erase virtually any evidence of their activities.
  
  Limit the Act as part of the operating system user right to as few accounts as possible—it should not even be assigned to the Administrators group under normal circumstances. When a service requires this user right, configure the service to log on by using the local System account, which has this user right inherently. Do not create a separate account and assign this user right to it.
  
  This user right is rarely needed by any accounts other than the local System account.

  Thus, it's not clear to me that the C2WTS service account actually requires this user right assignment.  The other two rights assignments, Impersonate a client after authentication and Log on as a service, are common assignments made to service accounts by the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard, and thus I have no difficulty with these.  More conclusively, I have set a domain account to run C2WTS that does not have the Act as part of the operating system user right assignment, and the service ran just fine without generating any events on the server.

This item and all items under it will not be crawled because the owner has set the NoCrawl flag to prevent it from being searchable.

1. In any browser, navigate to the root My Site URL.
2. From the Settings gear icon (top right corner), click Site Settings.  The Site Settings page is displayed.
3. In the Search group, look for Search and offline availability.
4. Click this link.  The Search and Offline Availability page is displayed.
5. For the Indexing Site Content setting, select Yes.
6. Click OK.
7. Start a new crawl.

• This item and all items under it will not be crawled because the owner has set the NoCrawl flag to prevent it from being searchable
• Enable content to be searchable

• This setting used to be located in the Site Administration group in SharePoint Server 2010.

Exception calling "Activate" with "0" argument(s): "Topology activation failed. Management called failed with System.InvalidOperationException: 'Unable to change topology when Generation controller is not active' at at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.IndexController.IndexController.IsEmptyIndex(String indexSystemName) at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.IndexController.IndexControllerManagementAgent.WrapCall[T](Func`2 original)" At line:1 char:1 + $Clone.Activate() + ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : SearchTopologyActivationException SharePoint 2013 Unable to change topology when Generation controller is not active

1. Action: attempted to reset index.

• Result: would not complete.

• Result: would not complete.

• Result: was able to perform a delete of the Search Service Application and then build a new search service application.

• Result: index partition no longer displays in degraded state.

1. Get out of any still running index reset or search application deletion prompts that display that they are still busy.
2. If you are not there already, remote into the farm server hosting the search service.
3. Stop the SharePoint Timer Service on this server.
4. Open up Windows Explorer, and then navigate to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\SharePoint\Config\.  You'll see one or more folders at this location named by a GUID.  Look for the most recent one. 

   Note: this posting assumes that the SharePoint 2013 binaries were installed default (to the C: drive).

5. Open this folder.  You will see a number of XML files. 
6. Delete all XML files in this folder only.
7. Now look for the file cache.ini.  It should be the only one remaining.
8. Open this file in a text editor.  It will contain a single six-digit number.
9. Edit this number randomly, but keeping it at six-digits.
10. Save the file.
11. Restart the SharePoint Timer Service.
12. Now delete the Search Service Application.
13. Rebuild the Search Service Application.

1. Create new Index Component and add it to a clone topology?
2. SharePoint 2013 Unable to change topology when Generation controller is not active
3. An update conflict has occurred, and you must re-try this action. The object SearchServiceApplication Name={FAST SSA} was updated by {account}, in OWSTIMER (5836) process, on machine {server name}.
4. One or more servers is not responding (SharePoint Foundation 2010)

• If your site displays an HTTP 500 Internal Server error page, after performing these stops (specifically, stopping and starting the SharePoint Timer Service), check IIS to verify that all application pools are started on the WFE you were working on.

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Microsoft-SharePoint Products-SharePoint Foundation
Date:          [Date/Time]
Event ID:      6398
Task Category: Timer
Level:         Critical
Keywords:      
User:          [FarmAccount]
Computer:      [WFE1]
Description:
The Execute method of job definition 
Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPAppInstallationJobDefinition 
(ID 16bfab57-4403-44da-9092-37f0f81fb32e) threw an exception. More 
information is included below.

Access to the path 'C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\SharePoint\AppInstallation'
is denied.
Event Xml:
...

1. Open Windows Explorer, and navigate to C:\ProgramData\Microsoft.
2. Right-click the SharePoint subfolder, and then choose Properties.
3. Select the Security tab.
4. Take  note of any entries here that display as SIDS only.
5. Perform SID lookup, both against AD and against the local machine.
6. Verify that the following two user groups are added and that they have been configured with the following permissions:
1. WSS_ADMIN_WPG
1. Full Control
2. WSS_WPG
1. Read & Execute
2. List folder contents
3. Read
7. Remove any corrupted accounts/groups that appear here (you will see their SIDS only).
8. Reboot the server.

• Sharepoint Execute method, Access denied to AppInstallation not clear service accounts
• Well-known security identifiers in Windows operating systems
• Windows PowerShell Tip of the Week: Determining the SID for a Local User Account
• Account permissions and security settings in SharePoint 2013

• I have found that performing a full re-installation of SharePoint Server 2013 (including configuration) seems to sometimes cause corruptions among the local user groups that SharePoint configures and that existing user groups are not properly cleaned up or overwritten when performing a re-installation.
• I have found that this critical event can be temporarily resolved by adding the (AppFabric) Distributed Cache service account to the local Administrators group on each server hosting the Distribute Cache service.  I had to reboot the server after doing this, or the new account privileges was not realized.
• Through investigation, the SIDS that I found here did not match up with the current SIDS for the WSS_ADMIN_WPG and WSS_WPG user groups already configured on the WFEs (the SIDS will be different from WFE to WFE - these are local user groups).  I think that these orphaned SIDS may reflect earlier SIDS for these same user groups from a previous installation.
• The farm service account is a member of the WSS_WPG and WSS_ADMIN_WPG local user groups.

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Application Error
Date:          [date/Time]
Event ID:      1000
Task Category: (100)
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      [WFE]
Description:
Faulting application name: WerFault.exe, version: 6.2.9200.16659, time stamp: 0x51db3bf4
Faulting module name: wer.dll, version: 6.2.9200.16384, time stamp: 0x501081cc
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x0000000000021fe5
Faulting process id: 0x318c
Faulting application start time: 0x01cf62c15e954491
Faulting application path: C:\Windows\system32\WerFault.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\system32\wer.dll
Report Id: 9d3c283d-ceb4-11e3-9405-00155d38891a
Faulting package full name: 
Faulting package-relative application ID: 
Event Xml:
...

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Application Error
Date:          [date/time]
Event ID:      1000
Task Category: (100)
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      [WFE]
Description:
Faulting application name: DistributedCacheService.exe, version: 1.0.4632.0, time stamp: 0x4eafeccf
Faulting module name: KERNELBASE.dll, version: 6.2.9200.16815, time stamp: 0x52f2ca60
Exception code: 0xe0434352
Fault offset: 0x00000000000264a8
Faulting process id: 0x3588
Faulting application start time: 0x01cf62c03cd277d1
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\AppFabric 1.1 for Windows Server\DistributedCacheService.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\system32\KERNELBASE.dll
Report Id: 9c501e53-ceb4-11e3-9405-00155d38891a
Faulting package full name: 
Faulting package-relative application ID: 
Event Xml:
...

Log Name:      Application
Source:        .NET Runtime
Date:          [date/time]
Event ID:      1026
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      [WFE]
Description:
Application: DistributedCacheService.exe
Framework Version: v4.0.30319
Description: The process was terminated due to an unhandled exception.
Exception Info: Microsoft.ApplicationServer.Caching.DataCacheException
Stack:
   at Microsoft.ApplicationServer.Caching.VelocityWindowsService.StartServiceCallback(System.Object)
   at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.RunInternal(System.Threading.ExecutionContext, System.Threading.ContextCallback, System.Object, Boolean)
   at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(System.Threading.ExecutionContext, System.Threading.ContextCallback, System.Object, Boolean)
   at System.Threading.QueueUserWorkItemCallback.System.Threading.IThreadPoolWorkItem.ExecuteWorkItem()
   at System.Threading.ThreadPoolWorkQueue.Dispatch()

Event Xml:
...

1. Check the HOST file on each of the farm servers and verify that the host names in the file are fully qualified.

1. Cache Administration with Windows PowerShell (AppFabric 1.1)
2. AppFabric 1.1 caching service crashes with System.UriFormatException: Invalid URI: The hostname could not be parsed
3. AppFabric Event ID 1000 and Event ID 1026 with SharePoint 2013
4. Raw error past data on PASTEBIN by Anonymous
5. AppFabric Caching and SharePoint: Concepts and Examples (Part 1)

• The primary posting that helped solve this was [3]. Hat tip to the experts at Sterling International Consulting Group for identifying this one as it relates to static private networking.

1. Delete the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard dialog.  Terminate the process of necessary to remove it.
2. Open the Services.msc panel, and then look for the SharePoint Timer Service.
3. Stop this service.
4. Open Windows Explorer, and then navigate to the cache folder at: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\SharePoint\Config.
5. Look for the most recent cache folder, and then open it.
6. Delete all files in this folder EXCEPT cache.ini.
7. Open the cache.ini file in a text editor, and then randomly modify the number, but keep it at the same number of digits.
8. Save the cache.ini file.
9. Start the SharePoint Timer Service.
10. Open a command prompt as Administrator.
11. Run the following command: Psconfig.exe -cmd upgrade -inplace b2b -wait -force
12. Check the Upgrade Status.

• Command-line reference for the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard (Office SharePoint Server)
• SharePoint 2013 Product configuration wizard failing at step 9/10
• sharepoint 2013 - After SP1 installation - Sharepoint products Configuration Wizard stuck

• Upgrade Status page: CA > Upgrade and Migration > Upgrade and Patch Management > Check upgrade status.
• Cache folder: You may get a Folder not found error trying to navigate to this folder.  If so, try navigating first to one of the higher tier folders, then double-clicking on each subfolder in turn.

Object Search Service failed in event OnBackup. For more information, see the spbackup.log or sprestore.log file located in the backup directory. 
 FaultException: Management called failed with System.InvalidOperationException: 'Job failed: Have tried to perform backup/restore operation twice on all in-sync members in cluster SP0e4f5d0f2fce.0, but none succeeded. Last failure message: Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.Seeding.SnapshotTransferException: Could not send chunk ms\%default\gen.000000000000007e.state: Localpath: [0-349> to target BackupDirectoryTarget[directory=[PathToBackupFolder]\spbr0000\I.0.0,validateTransfers=False] 
   at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.Seeding.SnapshotSender.SendChunks(ISnapshot snapshot, ISeedSource source, ISeedTarget target, SeedStatus status, Func`1 checkAborted, Int32 targetFragIndex) 
   at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.Seeding.SnapshotSender.FirstPhaseTransfer(ISeedSource source, ISeedTarget target, Action`1 updateProgress, Func`1 shouldAbort) 
   at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.Seeding.BackupWorker.BackupWork.DoFirstPhaseWork()' at    at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.IndexController.BackupService.ThrowOnFailure(JobStatus status) 
   at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.IndexController.BackupService.ProgressFirstPhase(String handle) 
   at Microsoft.Ceres.SearchCore.IndexController.IndexControllerManagementAgent.WrapCall[T](Func`2 original)

...
[Date/Time] Progress: [Search_AdminDB] 90 percent complete.
[Date/Time] Progress: [Search_AdminDB_CrawlStore] 100 percent complete.
[Date/Time] Progress: [Search_AdminDB_LinksStore] 91 percent complete.
[Date/Time] Progress: [Search_AdminDB_AnalyticsReportingStore] 91 percent 
complete.
[Date/Time] Progress: [Search_AdminDB] 97 percent complete.
[Date/Time] Verbose: [Search_AdminDB_CrawlStore] SQL Server Message: 
Processed 3 pages for database 'Search_AdminDB_CrawlStore', file 
'Search_AdminDB_CrawlStore_log' on file 1.
[Date/Time] Progress: [Search_AdminDB_LinksStore] 95 percent complete.
...

...
[Date/Time] FatalError: Object Search_AdminDB failed in event
OnBackupComplete. For more information, see the spbackup.log or 
sprestore.log file located in the backup directory.
 Aborted due to error in another component.
[Date/Time] Verbose: Starting object: Search_AdminDB_CrawlStore.
[Date/Time] FatalError: Object Admin (C: on [Search Host Server]) 
failed in event OnBackupComplete. For more information, see the spbackup.log 
or sprestore.log file located in the backup directory.
 Aborted due to error in another component.
...

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Microsoft-SharePoint Products-SharePoint Foundation
Date:          [Date/Time]
Event ID:      6398
Task Category: Timer
Level:         Critical
Keywords:      
User:          [Farm Account]
Computer:      [Search host server]
Description:
The Execute method of job definition Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.Backup.SPBackupRestoreJobDefinition (ID 26eac21f-d391-4024-a82f-8ee0b5738ba3) threw an exception. More information is included below.
The backup job failed. For more information, see the error log that is located in the backup directory.
Event Xml:
...

1. Identify the Search Service Account.
2. Navigate to the intranet folder to which you intend to write full farm backups
3. Grant the Search Service Account the following permissions to this folder:
1. Read
2. Write

1. SharePoint 2013 Farm Backup Error : Object Search Service Application failed in event OnBackup. Could not send chunk to target BackupDirectoryTarget
2. Plan for administrative and service accounts in SharePoint 2013
3. Account permissions and security settings in SharePoint 2013
4. Create and configure a Search service application in SharePoint Server 2013
5. Configure backup and restore permissions in SharePoint 2013
6. Back up Search service applications in SharePoint 2013

• General: the issue involves service accounts and permissions to the destination backup folder. 
• Backup log file: this will be found in the same folder containing the farm backup files.  For example, if your backup folder is SharePointBackup, inside this folder you will find a number of subfolders, each corresponding to a previous farm backup, numbered: spbr0000, spbr0001, spbr0002 and so on.  Open the most recent one to view the log of the most recent backup.
• Search Service Account Access to Backup: this is new from 2010.  For 2010, you had to grant access to the SQL Server Service Account.  I was not able to find any discussion on this among all of the expected Microsoft documentation resources (see references 2 - 6).  Thanks to Amol Meshe for resolving this one.

1. Preparation
1. Verify setup user administrator account (eg, spAdmin) is member of local Administrator group on all farm servers.
2. Identify service accounts and passwords:
1. Content Access service account
2. Administration and query service account
3. Map the Admin service account to diagnostic logging database as dbo.
4. Identify the web front end server names
1. WFE1
2. WFE2
5. Identify the drive on the servers where you want to store indexes.  This drive must be the same on all farm servers hosting SharePoint.
1. (eg) D:\SPIndex
6. Verify that any application pools created for previous installations (if any) of the Search Service Application have been removed.
1. (eg) Search Service AppPool
2. Execution
1. Instantiate Search Services
1. Remote into the application server as the setup user administrator account.
2. Open the SharePoint 2013 Management Shell as administrator.
3. Download this script: Enterprise Search Deployment Script.
4. Edit variable as appropriate to your farm.
5. Run the script.
6. After completion of the script, navigate to the Search Service Administration page and verify that the search service topology is similar to what is presented above.
7. Verify that the default content access service account is set as the crawl account.
2. Configure Content Sources
1. In CA, navigate to Content Sources, and then click on Local SharePoint sites (it will be the only item in the list at present).
2. Note the sources (URLs) present.
3. Create individual content sources for each of these URLs so that they can be crawl scheduled individually.  So, for example, configure the following entries:
1. Local SharePoint sites: point it to your primary web application.  If your farm has more than one web application supporting user websites, creating individual entries for each.
2. My Sites Content: point this to your farm's My Site web application.
3. User Profile Content: point this to the URL for crawling user profiles.  It will have the form like: sps3://MySites.com (non-SSL).
4. Configure crawl schedules for each content source as appropriate.  Create full and incremental schedules.
3. Configure Global Search Center
1. Create a Search Center.  Deploy this within the primary web application or in a new web application as appropriate to your needs.  I recommend adding it to your existing primary web application.
2. In CA, navigate to the Search Service Administration page, and then set the Global Search Center URL to the Search Center you have created for your web application.
4. Configure SSL Content sources
1. If your search service needs to use SSL to crawl certain content sources, you will need to configure the service to ignore SSL warnings.
2. In CA, go to: General Application Settings > Search > Farm Search Administration.
3. In the Farm-Level Search Settings group, look for Ignore SSL warnings.
4. Click No.
5. Enable Ignore SSL certificate name warnings.
6. Click OK.
3. Miscellaneous
1. If you plan to perform farm backups through Central Administration or PowerShell, be sure to grant the Search service account read and write permissions to the backup folder.  Otherwise, farm backups will fail on backup of the Search service configuration and data.  This is new from 2010.

• Manage search components in SharePoint Server 2013
• SharePoint 2013 Unable to change topology when Generation controller is not active
• Manage the index component in SharePoint Server 2013
• Get-SPEnterpriseSearchStatus
• Manage the search topology in SharePoint Server 2013
• Remove-SPServiceApplicationPool
• Get-SPServiceApplicationPool
• Configure a service application by using a Windows PowerShell script (SharePoint Server 2010)
• Service application cmdlets in SharePoint 2013
• Deploy people search in SharePoint Server 2013
• SharePoint 2013: FatalError: Object Search Service failed in event OnBackup
• Enterprise Search Deployment Script

• Farm topology: This procedure was executed on a five-server farm (including OWA and SQL), Windows Server 2012 VMs.
• Deleting the Search Service Application through Central Administration does not remove the application pools that were created for the Search Service Application.  Thus, to completely remove all artifacts associated with the Search Service Application, and thus be able to start over from scratch, you must also manually remove those application pools that were created for it.
• Default Content Sources: After deploying the Search Service Application, you will need to configure content sources. Your farm content sources (aside from CA) will automatically have their URLs added to the Local SharePoint sites group - including My Sites.  I recommend separating content sources, so as to be able to implement separate crawl schedules for them.  Not all content sources require as frequent crawling as your primary web applications.
• User profile content: if you want to enable searches of user profiles, you will need to add the URL for this manually.
• Search Service Account access to backup folder: I don't know how or why, but in SharePoint 2013, the Search Service Account plays a role in the farm backup process when it comes to backup of Search. This was not the case in SharePoint 2010, where I only had to grant the farm and sql server service accounts this access.  I discovered this new wrinkle while actually trying to perform a full farm backup for the first time and then troubleshooting and resolving its initial failure.

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Microsoft-SharePoint Products-SharePoint Foundation
Date:          [Date/Time]
Event ID:      8313
Task Category: Topology
Level:         Error
Keywords:      
User:          [Farm Service Account]
Computer:      [Application Server]
Description:
A failure was reported when trying to invoke a service application: EndpointFailure
Process Name: OWSTIMER
Process ID: 1884
AppDomain Name: DefaultDomain
AppDomain ID: 1
Service Application Uri: urn:schemas-microsoft-com:sharepoint:service: 
26fdc21debf74e8a8fbb25146d98c2c4#authority=urn:
uuid:3e1fa89c3f23469f8e4947ba8a99c448&authority=
[Application Server]/Topology/topology.svc
Active Endpoints: 1
Failed Endpoints:1
Affected Endpoint: [Application Server]/26fdc21debf74e8a8fbb25146d98c2c4/
SearchService.svc
Event Xml:
...

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Microsoft-SharePoint Products-SharePoint Foundation
Date:          [Date/Time]
Event ID:      8313
Task Category: Topology
Level:         Error
Keywords:      
User:          [Farm Service Account]
Computer:      [Application Server]
Description:
A failure was reported when trying to invoke a service application: 
EndpointFailure
Process Name: w3wp
Process ID: 15280
AppDomain Name: /LM/W3SVC/522633276/ROOT-1-130460993295064685
AppDomain ID: 2
Service Application Uri: urn:schemas-microsoft-com:sharepoint:service:
7c3ac0e364d64a9bad706582b3ae004d#authority=
urn:uuid:3e1fa89c3f23469f8e4947ba8a99c448&authority=
[Application Server]/Topology/topology.svc
Active Endpoints: 1
Failed Endpoints:1
Affected Endpoint: [Application Server]/7c3ac0e364d64a9bad706582b3ae004d/
MetadataWebService.svc
Event Xml:

1.  Rebuild the search service application.

• EventID 8313 A failure was reported when trying to invoke a service application: EndpointFailure

• The reference cited above did not directly apply to our situation but pointed the way to the solution: namely, rebuilding the affected service.

[date] [time],,Error,[298] SQLServer Error: 15404 <c/> Could not obtain 
information about Windows NT group/user [Account you are logged in as]<c/> 
error code 0x5. [SQLSTATE 42000] (ConnIsLoginSysAdmin)

1. Determine the domain account that you will use to login to SQL Server as (eg, spAdmin) to create the farm database maintenance plans. 
2. Launch Active Directory Users and Computers as administrator.
3. Navigate to this account in the directory.
4. Right-click this account and choose Properties.
5. Select the Security tab.
6. Click the Add button.
7. Enter the domain account and click OK.
8. On the Properties dialog, select this account in the Group or user names list.
9. Ensure that Read is enabled and all its subpermissions (eg, Read account restrictions, Read general information, etc).  Disabling and enabling Read automatically enables all the Read subpermissions. 
10. Click OK.

• SharePoint 2013: Service Account Configurations
• Initial deployment administrative and service accounts in SharePoint 2013

• Check repeatability: explore the issue further and find that you can't create alerts either; not even with your administrator account. 
• Determine scope: conduct inquiries among IT staff, you learn that staff are receiving email notifications from process workflows; and from your users you discover that they are receiving notifications when you grant them new permissions.  Therefore, you can logically conclude that the cause is not due to firewall or email server communication issues.
• Research indicators:  a standard search found a few references involving the error message, all of which seemed to indicate that the problem involved user profile service application configuration, specifically, appropriate mapping of the AD email field.
• Verify conclusion: perform ad-hoc search of user profiles to view random selection, and then check email address.  None indicated for any user.  Check email field mapping: currently set to default, or aCSPolicyName.

1. Launch Central Administration.
2. Go to: Application Management > Service Applications > Manage service applications > User Profile Service > Manage User Properties.
3. Scroll down to the Contact Information section and then look for Work email.
4. Hover the cursor over the Work email field, to expose the drop down, and then select Edit from this drop down.
5. Scroll down to the Property Mapping for Synchronization section.
6. Click the Remove button.
7. In the Add New Mapping section, select mail from the Attribute drop down.
8. Click the Add button.  A new entry will appear in the Property Mapping for Synchronization.
9. Click OK.
10. Go to: Go to: Application Management > Service Applications > Manage service applications > User Profile Service.
11. In the Synchronization section, click Start Profile Synchronization.
12. After this completes, wait an additional hour before engaging in any significant testing of alert creation.

1. email not working : The following users do not have e-mail addresses specified
2. SharePoint 2013 Alert Error: You do not have an email address
3. Error when you create an alert in Microsoft SharePoint Online in Office 365 for enterprises pre-upgrade: "You do not have an email address"
4. Configure alert settings for a Web application (SharePoint Server 2010)
5. Manage user profile synchronization in SharePoint Server 2013
6. Synchronize user and group profiles in SharePoint Server 2013
7. Timer job reference (SharePoint 2013)
8. Troubleshooting Steps for SharePoint Alert Email Does Not Go Out

• User email addresses will not be immediately available to the alert creation process after completion of the user profile synchronization.  This is because further internal process must be complete that update internal user profile tables with the new email data.  This internal process involves various User Profile Service jobs that may take some time to complete.  From my own experience, it took upwards of an hour before all users could successfully receive list and library alerts.

Processing this item failed because of an unknown error when trying to parse its contents...

The content processing pipeline failed to process the item...

1. Description: the Search Service account requires specific local user rights assignments to function fully, including:
1. Adjust memory quotas for a process
2. Impersonate a client after authentication
3. Replace a process level token
2. Short term: add the search service account (and the content access service account, if you use such) to the local Administrators group on each server in the farm hosting SharePoint Server.  By default, the members of the local Administrators group are automatically granted most all user rights, including those listed above.
3. Long-term: request your network administrators to modify your organization's GPO to grant your farm's Search Service account these rights.

• SharePoint 2013 search error ‘Sandbox worker is closed’
• Crawl error SharePoint 2013 - Processing this item failed because of an unknown error when trying to parse its contents
• Insufficient SQL Server database permissions - Event 5214 (SharePoint 2010 Products)
• Crawl errors: Sandbox worker pool is closed
• SharePoint 2013: Service Account Configurations and Permissions

1. Connect to the root site  of the My Site web application as the SharePoint setup administrator account (eg, spAdmin).
2. Go: Settings > Site Settings > Look and Feel > Quick Launch.
3. Click New Heading, and then configure as desired.

• Deep Dive into the Confusing SharePoint 2013 MySite Quick Launch Left Nav

• For my users, I added a heading link that navigates users back to their organization's home page.  I changed the order so that this link appears at the top of the quick launch list of links.
• My 2013 farms are updated through the April 2014 CU.

Get-SPProfileLeader : UserProfileApplicationNotAvailableException_Logging ::
UserProfileApplicationProxy.ApplicationProperties ProfilePropertyCache 
does not have 48c36bfc-c2de-4a8a-afd5-04885b11c9bb
At line:1 char:1
+ Get-SPProfileLeader -ProfileServiceApplicationProxy $upaProxy
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidData: (Microsoft.Offic...CmdletGetLeader:
SPCmdletGetLeader) [
   Get-SPProfileLeader], UserProfileApplicationNotAvailableException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : 
      Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.PowerShell.SPCmdletGetLeader

1. Login to a farm server (that hosts SharePoint Server) as the farm setup user administrator account.
2. Launch Central Administration as administrator.
3. Go: Application Management > Service Applications > Manage service applications.
4. Select (don't click on) your user profile service application.
5. Up above, on the Service Applications ribbon, click the Permissions button.
6. Add the farm setup administrator account.
7. Enable Full Control for this account.
8. Click OK.
9. Close out the shell that produced the error message and open a new one as Administrator.
10. Re-run your commands.

• People search relevance is not optimized when the Active Directory has errors in the manager reporting structure
• When setting the MySiteHostUrl I get a UserProfileApplicationNotAvailableException
• Get-SPServiceApplication
• Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy
• Get-SPProfileLeader

• Thanks to Network Steve's post and Bram de Jager's post (referenced above) for providing the clues needed to solve this issue.  Steve suggested running the shell and commands under the farm service account to solve the problem I was experiencing.  This hinted at a permissions issue.  Bram's post was completely unrelated to the issue I was experiencing, but reminded me about how accounts are granted access to the User Profile service application.  Integrating the two discussions produced the necessary solution.
• Traditional SharePoint Server 2013 farm; hosted on Windows Server 2012 VMs.  Hyper-V.  Patched through April 2014 CU.

1. Determine the company leader or leaders that you want to define.  For example, DOMAIN\Department.Head.
2. Remote into a farm server (that hosts SharePoint Server) as the farm setup user administrator account.
3. Grant the farm setup user administrator account full control to the User Profile Service connection.
4. Open a SharePoint Management Shell as administrator.
5. Get the User Profile Service application proxy ID by executing the following command:

   Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy

   This returns a list of all the application proxies (and their IDs) on your farm.
6. Using the ID you obtained in the previous step, now get an instance of the User Profile Service application proxy by executing the following command:

   $upaProxy = Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy [YourUpsApplicationProxyID]

7. Now add the leader or leaders by repeatedly executing the following command as needed against this instance:

   Add-SPProfileLeader -ProfileServiceApplicationProxy $upaProxy -Name "DOMAIN\Department.Head"

8. Close the shell.
9. Navigate to: General Application Settings > Search > Farm Search Administration > Search Service > Content Sources.
10. Launch a full crawl of user profile content.
11. Navigate back to the Review problems and solutions page.
12. Re-analyze the issue.  The results should be immediate.

• SharePoint 2013 Health analyzer error - People Search relevance is not optimized when the Active Directory has errors
• How do I fix “People search relevance is not optimized when the Active Directory has errors in the manager reporting structure”?
• It’s all about relevance. The *-SPProfileLeader Windows PowerShell cmdlets in SharePoint Server 2010 SP1
• SharePoint 2013: UserProfileApplicationNotAvailableException_Logging... ProfilePropertyCache does not have...
• Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy
• Get-SPProfileLeader
• Add-SPProfileLeader

• If you are working within an department that is part of a larger organization, and your farm access is limited to the department, identify the most senior leader or leaders in your department. Scope is important here.  For example, for one customer, the farm is accessible only within a specific department of the organization; and thus I configured the User Profile Service connection to only pull those user profiles from the organization's AD that are within the department.  Therefore, in this scenario, the profile leader is the head of the department, because, within the bounds of the department, the department head does not report to anyone else.
• If you haven't done so yet, configure your User Profile Service content as a separate content source for Search purposes.  Doing so makes it more convenient to perform focus content crawls and thereby minimize impact search crawls may have on farm performance during normal business hours.

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Microsoft-SharePoint Products-SharePoint Foundation
Date:          [date/time]
Event ID:      5214
Task Category: Database
Level:         Critical
Keywords:      
User:          [Search service account]
Computer:      [A query processing host server, eg WFE]
Description:
Insufficient SQL database permissions for user 'Name: [Search service 
account] SID: [SID] ImpersonationLevel: None' in database 
'[FarmConfigurationDB]' on SQL Server instance '[SQL Server Name]'. 
Additional error information from SQL Server is included below.

The EXECUTE permission was denied on the object 'proc_GetTimerRunningJobs', 
database '[FarmConfigurationDB]', schema 'dbo'.
Event Xml:
...

1. Adding the SPDataAccess role:
1. In Object Explorer, expand the Security node, and then double-click on the search service account (eg, spSearch).  The Login Properties dialog appears.
2. In the Select a page navigation panel, select User Mapping.
3. In the Users mapped to this login panel, select the farm configuration database (eg, farm_Config).
4. Enable the SPDataAccess role
5. Click OK.
2. Add WSS_Content_Application_Pools role to proc_GetTimerRunningJobs:
1. In Object Explorer, expand the Databases node, and then look for the farm configuration database (eg, farm_config).
2. Under this database node, expand Programmability> Stored Procedures.
3. Under the Stored Procedures node, scroll down until you find dbo.proc_GetTimerRunningJobs.
4. Right-click on this object, and then select Properties.  The Stored Procedure Properties dialog appears.
5. In the Select a page frame, select Permissions.
6. Click the Search button.  The Select Users or Roles dialog appears.
7. Enter WSS_Content_Application_Pools and then click the Check Names button.  Brackets should appear around what you entered, indicating that this object name was recognized.
8. Click OK. The Select Users or Roles dialog closes.  You will see this new role now appear under Users or roles.
9. Select the WSS_Content_Application_Pools role.
10. Below, in the Permissions for WSS_Content_Application_Pools panel, enable Grant for the Execute permission.
11. Click OK.
12. Exit SQL Server management Studio.

1. Event ID 5214 (Windows SharePoint Services health model)
2. Insufficient SQL Server database permissions - Event 5214 (SharePoint 2010 Products)
3. Search account got - Insufficient sql database permissions for user. EXECUTE permission was denied on the object proc_Gettimerrunningjobs
4. EXECUTE permission denied on SharePoint Config DB
5. My Sites and The SPDataAccess SQL Role
6. Account permissions and security settings in SharePoint 2013

• It's unclear to me at this point, which method (1 or 2) is better.  Reading reference [3] would seem to indicate to indicate the second method.  But reference [5] raises an intriguing alternative.  More generally, it's unclear from existing Microsoft documentation (namely, reference [6]), what role the search service account should have with respect to the farm configuration database and the proc_GetTimerRunningJobs stored procedure specifically.  Clarification from Microsoft on what it intended here would be helpful.

1. Configure Object Cache
1. Add Object Cache Accounts
1. Reference: Configure object cache user accounts in SharePoint Server 2013
2. Remote into the application server under the SharePoint setup Administration account.
3. Go to: Central Administration > Application Management > Manage Web Applications.
4. Select a web application.
5. From the ribbon, click User Policy.
6. Click Add Users.
7. Leave the zone default as All zones, and then click Next.
8. In the Choose Users section, add the account that you want to use as the Object Cache Reader.
9. In the Choose Permissions section, check Enable Read - Has full read-only access.
10. Click Finish.
11. Click Add Users again.
12. Leave the zone default as All zones, and then click Next.
13. In the Choose Users section, add the account that you want to use as the Object Cache User.
14. In the Choose Permissions section, check Full Control - Has full control.
15. Click Finish.
2. Add Object Cache Account Claims User Names [see note]
1. Open a SharePoint Management Shell as administrator
2. Execute the following script:

   
   $wa = Get-SPWebApplication -Identity "<webapplication>"
   $wa.Properties["portalsuperuseraccount"] = "i:0#.w|Domain\spSuperU"
   $wa.Properties["portalsuperreaderaccount"] = "i:0#.w|Domain\spSuperR"
   $wa.Update()
   
   

3. Execute IISReset on all machines.
3. Configure Disk-based Cache Settings
1. Reference: Configure BLOB cache settings
2. The following steps must be performed on each WFE.
3. Remote into the WFE under the SharePoint Administrator account.
4. Go to: C:\inetpub\wwwroot\wss\VirtualDirectories\.
5. Look for the folder corresponding to your web application and open it.
6. Look for the file Web.Config.
7. Open this file in any text editor.
8. In this file, look for the XML tag, <BlobCache...
9. Look for these attributes of this tag:
1. location
2. enabled
10. Change the location attribute to whatever is appropriate to your system. 

    Best Practice is to point it to another drive on the WFE so that its write operations do not impact the system drive write operations.

11. Change the enabled attribute to true.
12. Save the file.
13. Repeat for each WFE.
2. Remove Unnecessary Cache Host
1. Check AppFabric Status
1. References: Cache Administration with Windows PowerShell (Windows Server AppFabric Caching) , SharePoint 2013 + Distributed Cache (AppFabric) Troubleshooting
2. Remote into the application server as the SharePoint setup user administrator account.
3. Launch the SharePoint Management Shell as administrator.
4. Run the following script:

   
   Get-SPServiceInstance | ? {($_.service.tostring()) -eq "SPDistributedCacheService Name=AppFabricCachingService"} | select Server, Status
   
   

   This returns a list of your hosts and their network status. You want them all to be online.
5. In the same shell, run the next script:

   Use-CacheCluster
   Get-CacheHost
   

   This returns the AppFabricCacheService status on each host. They should all be UP.
6. If these are not UP, the removal will fail.
2. Remove the host
1. References: Manage the Distributed Cache service in SharePoint Server 2013, SharePoint 2013: Distributed Cache (AppFabrikCache) part 2/2
2. Remote into the application server as the SharePoint setup user administrator account.
3. Launch the SharePoint Management Shell as administrator.
4. Run the following script:

   
   $instanceName = “SPDistributedCacheService Name = AppFabricCachingService” 
   $serviceInstance = Get-SPServiceInstance | ? {( $_.service.tostring()) –eq $instanceName –and ($_.server.name) –eq $env:computername 
   $serviceInstance.UnProvision()
   Remove-SPDistributedCacheServiceInstance
   
   

3. Change Distributed Cache Service Account
1. Reference: Manage the Distributed Cache service in SharePoint Server 2013: Change the service account, Changing the Distributed Cache Service Account
2. Remote into the application server as the SharePoint setup user administrator account.
3. Launch the SharePoint Management Shell as administrator.
4. Run the following script:

   
   $Farm = Get-SPFarm
   $CacheService = $Farm.Services | Where {$_.Name -eq "AppFabricCachingService"}
   $Account = Get-SPManagedAccount -Identity "Domain\ServiceAccountNamer"
   $CacheService.ProcessIdentity.CurrentIdentityType = "SpecificUser"
   $CacheService.ProcessIdentity.ManagedAccount = $Account
   $CacheService.ProcessIdentity.Update()
   
   

• Get-SPWebApplication
• Cache settings operations in SharePoint Server 2013
• Configure object cache user accounts in SharePoint Server 2013
• SharePoint 2013 + Distributed Cache (AppFabric) Troubleshooting
• Changing the Distributed Cache Service Account
• AppFabric Caching (and SharePoint): Configuration and Deployment (Part 2)
• Use-CacheCluster
• Get-CacheHost
• SharePoint 2013: Critical Event 6398: The Execute method of job definition Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPAppInstallationJobDefinition... threw an exception
• SharePoint 2013: The process was terminated due to an unhandled exception
• Get-SPServiceInstance
• Unprovision duplicate service instances in SharePoint 2013
• SharePoint 2013: Distributed Cache (AppFabrikCache) part 1/2
• SharePoint 2013: Distributed Cache (AppFabrikCache) part 2/2

• If you implement claims-based authentication, you must add the cache account claims user names to each web application's User Policy.  You do this using PowerShell, and you must use the claims user name format as shown.
• By default, the distributed cache service is installed on each server to which you installed and configured SharePoint Server 2013.  Thus, if you installed SharePoint Server 2013 first to an application server, this server will be the first to host a cache service instance.  Now, if you are deploying a traditional topology (application server running most services and the CA web application and customer websites running on two or more WFEs), it is unnecessary to run the distributed cache service on the application server as it performs no useful customer function.  Therefore, it can be safely removed from the application server(s) if you want to.  If you are deploying SharePoint Server 2013 to more than three servers, you will definitely need to remove it from at least one of these.
• It isn't absolutely necessary to remove the distributed cache running an application server.  It will not adversely impact farm operation leaving it there.

Errors were found when compiling the workflow.  The workflow files were saved but cannot be run.
Microsoft.SharePoint.SPException: App Management Shared Service Proxy is not installed.
   at Microsoft.SharePoint.AppRegistration.GetProxy(SPServiceContext serviceContext)
   at Microsoft.SharePoint.AppRegistration.AddOrUpdateAppNoPermissionCheck(SPAppPrincipalInfo appInfo)
   at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPAppPrincipalManager.RegisterWithInternalDirectory(SPAppPrincipalIdentityProvider identityProvider, String nameIdentifier, String displayName, List`1 appEndpointAuthorities, List`1 redirectAddr

1. Remote into a SharePoint 2013 farm server using the Administation user setup account.
2. Launch Central Administration
3. Navigate to: Application Management > Service Applications > Manage service applications.
4. On the Service Applications ribbon, click the New button, and then select App Management Service.
5. Enter configuration information as appropriate.  This is your opportunity to create a simple database name, rather than have one with a long GUID.
1. This service can use an existing application pool just fine.  I recommend using your farm's general application services app pool.
6. Click OK.  It takes 1 - 2 minutes for the new service application to be created.  On completion, the page will refresh, and you will see it listed at the top as started.  Though the service application and service application proxy are started, the App Management service itself must still be started.
7. Navigate to: Application Management > Service Applications > Manage services on server.  Start the service.

• Error: App Management Shared Service Proxy is Not Installed
• SharePoint 2013: App Management Service
• Streamlined topology for sharepoint server 2013

• See the references for details on doing all of this via PowerShell.
• The App Management service only needs to run on one farm server.   Microsoft does not provide a recommendation on which farm server(s) should run this service.  I recommend starting it on one of your farm's application (or "batch") servers. Having it run on just one server is all that's necessaryto enable users to publish their 2013 workflows. 

The option for the SharePoint 2013 Workflow platform is not available because the workflow service is not configured on the server.  Please contact your server administrator.

1. Check software installation:
1. Workflow Manager 1.0 installed to application server.
2. Workflow Manager Client 1.0 installed to all SharePoint servers in farm.
2. Check workflow services are running.
1. These should be running on the application server hosting Workflow Manager.
2. The following services were verified as being started:
1. Service Bus Gateway
2. Service Bus Message Broker
3. Windows Fabric Host Service
4. Workflow Manager Backend
3. Check the Workflow Service Application Proxy was started and connected.
4. Check that the workflow service was registered for HTTP and a valid URL existed (Get-SPWorkflowServiceApplicationProxy).
5. Check that the Workflow Management Site is started  and correctly served the service configuration schema (h-t-t-p://AppServer:12291).
6. Check that the Workflow Management Application Pool was started.
7. Check that web front end reboot after workflow manager client installation.

1. Install the Workflow Manager Client on all web front end servers.
2. Reboot each server after installation.

• Install and configure workflow for SharePoint Server 2013
• Troubleshooting Workflow Manager 1.0 Management and Execution
• Installing Workflow Manager 1.0
• Use Windows PowerShell cmdlets to manage workflow in SharePoint 2013
• Register-SPWorkflowService
• Get-SPWorkflowServiceApplicationProxy
• Get-SPFarmConfig
• Find the Workflow Service URL for a SharePoint 2013 Farm
• The option for the SharePoint 2013 Workflow platform is not available
• what is opposite of "Register-SPWorkflowService"???

1. Connect to the site collection as farm administrator (eg, spAdmin).
2. Navigate to the target list of library.
3. Click the LIST tab, and then click List Settings.
4. Under Permissions Management group, click Save list as template.
5. Enter information as desired, but be sure NOT to enable the Include Content option.
6. Click OK.  This saves the list or library as a template to the site collection's Template Gallery from whence you can create new instances of this list or library anywhere else in the site collection.
7. From the Settings menu, select Site Settings.
8. On the Site Settings page, look under Site Administration, and then click Content andstructure.
9. In the left tree view pane, open the tree to the desired list or library, and then click this list or library.
10. In the right pane, increase the list item count sufficiently to include either all of the list items you want migrate or at least to limit the number of times you need to perform this operation.
11. From the Actions dropdown, select Copy.  You could select Move, but I like to be on the safe side and only delete a source item if I am absolutely sure it is safe to do so.
12. Navigate to the next 100, 500 or 1000 and repeat.

• Publishing features overview (SharePoint Server 2010)