What the heck?? You thought you were admin! You check the Farm Administrators list and your account is there. So, what gives??

Windows User-Access-Control is getting in the way. Although your account is Farm admin, because of UAC, you’re still not permitted to do stuff in Central Admin like create new Web apps. The fix? Disable UAC and reboot Windows. After reboot, you should be able to create new Web apps:

Caution: after you have created your Web apps and Site collections in Central Admin, turn on the UAC again and reboot. Turning off UAC for good is not recommended even if it’s annoying.  If you permanently turn off UAC, malware might have a chance to install in your PC (you are admin, no prompts for system mods—yikes!!)

When you run the PSCONFIGUI, since you already configured the SharePoint config database, will start-off at the following step of the Configuration Wizard. Notice that my database-server and database-name have already been pre-populated. Click Next.

SP Configuration Wizard - DB Selection

You get to specify additional information such as Authentication provider (choose NTLM, especially if you do not have domain controller  in your network). You can also choose the port number where Central Admin will run.

SharePoint Configuration Wizard -Completing

Click Next until it runs the actual  configuration of the Central Admin:

SP Configuration Wizard -Configuring

Once the Wizard is finished, run your Central Admin. If things were installed and configured correctly, you should be able to launch Central Admin:

1st Time in Central Admin 2010

New-SPConfigurationDatabase: Could not load file or assembly ‘Microsoft.IdentityModel, Version 3.5.0.0. The Power Shell looks like the following when you’re running New-SPConfigurationDatabase to configure your SP database for the first time:

Could not load Microsoft.IdentityModel

The fix: Install Microsoft Identity Framework to address this problem.

New-SPConfigurationDatabase: The user does not exist or is not unique. You get to the point in the New-SPConfigurationDatabase command-let that asks you for the Farm Credentials. You didn’t fully qualify the username with the domain or computer name.

New-SPConfigurationDatabase - user does not exist

To fix this, simply make sure that the user account you are specifying for the Farm Credentials is fully-qualified with the domain-name or, if using local accounts, the computer name. Example: “macbookpro\gabe”.

New-SPConfigurationDatabase :  Unknown error (0×80005000) At line: 1 char:20. + New-SPConfigurationDatabase <<<< + CategoryInfo    : InvalidData

Unknown error when running New-SPConfigurationDatabase

This one frustrated the heck out of me. I configured my Macbook Pro already but I was installing SharePoint 2010 on another PC(has Intel Core i7 processor) in my office when I got this message. I thought the second pass-through would be easier. I already know I must follow every-step of the SharePoint 2010 on Windows 7 Development Workstation Guide.  So, how can I possibly still mess it up?? You see, I’d get past the Passphrase question and it would process the command for a while and spit out the error message only at the very end. When I look at my SQL Server, the Config database is created but the “SharePoint Admin Content” database has not been created yet. I manually added the user-account to sysadmin group in SQL. I made the  Windows login Local Admin. I serviced-pack the SQL instance at least twice. Still the InvalidData error message like above. I uninstalled SharePoint 2010 and re-installed it. When I uninstalled the entire SharePoint 2010 (remember, I was aiming for the “Complete” installation option), I reinstalled the second time just using the “Stand-Alone” install. I was thinking, this sucks, having to use SQL Express because I’m going for Stand-Alone install. I finished the Stand-Alone installation. I go ahead and try to configure it and the psconfigui.exe (SP Product Configuration Wizard) and bam—STILL an error! But this time, the error message was more helpful—it told me that IIS 6 is not installed. I look at my installed Windows 7 features and sure enough, IIS 6 wasn’t installed yet! I was pretty sure I ran everything on the checklist and I couldn’t have missed anything. Obviously, I missed something, and this something was the required Windows Features that must be turned on. So I installed II 6 feature on my Windows 7 and the Stand-Alone configuration worked and I saw the Central Admin. If you get this Unknown error (0×80005000), check your installed Windows Features and make sure you have IIS 6 Management Console installed.

IIS 6 Management Consol turned-on

Okay, after going through the stand-alone install and was made to enable IIS6, I uninstalled SharePoint 2010, again! Why did I uninstall it? Because it was installed using Stand-Alone install which uses SQL Server Express.  This final time, I was determined to make the Complete installation (can add servers to farm) work. I installed the SharePoint 2010. I ran Power Shell and ran the New-SPConfigurationDatabase command-let and was able to create the configuration database. Yay!!!

SQL Server after successful New-SPConfigurationDatabase

My MacBook Pro 13 Windows (Ultimate) Experience Index looks like the following:

Not too shabby. Lowest score is the graphics (NVidia 930M) but shouldn’t be an issue with regards to SharePoint and development work in general. See that Memory and Primary hard disk scoring 5.9? That worried me. The hard drive speed is only 5400 RPM and that could be a bottleneck for database read/writes. I went ahead and installed SharePoint 2010 on the MacBook Pro/Windows 7 anyway.

Instead of rewriting the steps needed to install SharePoint 2010 on Windows 7 for a development rig, I will point you to existing resources out there. Too many write-ups regarding this topic already. So here they are, the ones that I’ve tried and tested:

• If you are going to read anything about installing SharePoint 2010 on Windows 7, this is the resource you want – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee554869(office.14).aspx
• Execute EVERY step outlined in that walkthrough. Don’t even try to shortcut or think that you can do it without reading any documentation. You may get past the installation but you will pull hair out when it’s time to configure your farm. So just do it, every step in that walkthrough! I will show some of the errors I encountered when I tried to “fast-track” the SharePoint installation.
• Here’s another good one – http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/blogs/fromthefield/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=112. This one talks about how to configure the scalable farm (not the Stand-Alone setup that uses SQL Express) for development purposes while using local accounts (instead of domain accounts). SharePoint 2010 needs domain accounts to configure. If you are building a “SharePoint workstation”, it’s very common to use local accounts instead of domain accounts (maybe because getting in touch with the AD admins is not easy—just create local accounts yourself). See, my MacBook Pro is not joined to a domain. I have to use non-domain accounts. I wouldn’t have been able to configure my “SharePoint farm” to use a true SQL Server 2008 if not for this walkthrough. Remember, if you do a stand-alone install, the Web apps use the SQL Express for the databases—not really  my ideal configuration!!

Here’s the first error message I encountered:

I was so excited to install SharePoint 2010 after I got my MAPS subscription that I just double-clicked the setup.exe. The above message is what I got! You have to edit the \Files\Setup\config,xml of the SharePoint 2010 install directory and add the following:

<Setting Id="AllowWindowsClientInstall" Value="True"/>

This was mentioned in Step 2: Install the Prerequisites for SharePoint 2010 of the MSDN walkthrough. Fast-forward to the end of the SharePoint 2010 installation/configuration. In Central Admin, you should see this:

Again, don’t skip any steps—follow each and every one!

In follow-up blog-posts, I’ll show the other errors I received while attempting to install/configure the SharePoint farm and how to address them.

Update 6/11/2010:  Here’s the screenshot of the Windows Task Manager of the Macbook Pro when running SharePoint 2010, SQL Server 2008, IIS Management Console, Internet Explorer, and Visual Studio 2010 (debugging/attaching to processes).

Windows 7 Task Manager in Macbook Pro

I found this walkthrough from Bamboo Solutions on how to install SharePoint on Windows 7. It worked and all I can say is wow! Now, there were two issues that I ran into when I tried to follow the walkthrough. First issue I ran into was is making the boot-strapper launch the MOSS installer. I have the original media from 2007 and no matter how many times I tried to make Bamboo Solution’s setup-helper launch that setup.exe, it wouldn’t launch it. The error message that I got was:

WSS on Vista - Setup Controller Command Line Help

I tried renaming the setup.exe file to SharePoint.exe, thinking maybe, just maybe the setup-helper is file-name dependent. It didn’t work. Finally, I decided to just go ahead and download the trial version of  MOSS (if you have proper license):

• x86 MOSS 2007 Trial
• x64 MOSS 2007 Trial
• x86 WSS 3.0
• x64 WSS 3.0

If you don’t have MOSS license, just download WSS 3.0. If you have MOSS license, you can enter your key during the installation to make the installation permanent. I tried x64 MOSS 2007 trial with the Bamboo helper and it worked.

One more issue I ran into was when I ran the SharePoint Configuration Wizard for the first time. It said that I don’t have IIS installed. Well, I already had IIS running–IIS 7. When I picked the Windows feature to install, I did not select the IIS 6 Management Compatibility:

Turn on IIS 6 Management Compatibility in Windows Features

The moment I turned on IIS 6 Management Compatibility, the SharePoint Configuration Wizard was able to proceed.

I’m very happy with my laptop setup now. I have MOSS running on it and I don’t even need a virtual machine anymore. Do I think it’s risky to install MOSS on my base OS? I don’t think so; I’ve been installing and running SharePoint since 2007 and I have yet to see it mess up the operability of an application or service in Windows. But then again, I’ve always used Windows 2003 Server. Who knows what kind of issue I will run into running MOSS on top of Windows 7.

As much as I recommend you guys trying MOSS/SharePoint on Windows 7, I highly recommend you run the upcoming SharePoint 2010 beta on a virtual machine only! When SharePoint 2010 Beta comes out next month, I will be running that inside a virtual Windows 2008 Server.