Before you start reading this I would like to mention that steps mentioned here are to create a Virtual Machine in Azure for demo, development or labs purpose.
I decided to write this blog as I faced some difficulties while installing SharePoint 2019 on Azure Virtual Machine, I never faced these while installing it on Physical machines or company provided Virtual Machines.
We are going to install everything in one box that is SQL Server and SharePoint 2019 both which means “Single Server Farm”, although Microsoft recommends to have a separate server for SQL server but I was able to install both in same. Read more here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/install/planning-for-a-minrole-server-deployment-in-sharepoint-server
Steps are broadly like this:
- Create a virtual machine in Azure with SQL Server 2016 installed already
- Add a domain services in Azure Virtual Machine
- Install SharePoint 2019
Create a Virtual Machine in Azure
You can always create a free Azure Account from here https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/free/.
Once you have created an account please login to https://portal.azure.com
Follow the steps as shown below:
- Click on the menu and select “Virtual Machines” and then click Add from top
2. Once you get to the page you will have lots of tabs to filled in, I have highlighted few fields which are required and needs to be filled in, rest of it can be left as is.
Important field which we need to select is “Image” that is we need a Windows Server etc, for easy installation I will be selecting a Windows server with SQL Server 2016 already installed in it so that we don’t have to do that manually.
3. Select “Browse all public and private images” and search for SQL server 2016 and select Standard SP 2 version, for size I recommend 4 CPU and 16 GB memory else the server runs very slow as SQL and SharePoint both are running on the same server.
4. Next step is to create an Admin account so pick a name and password which you can remember. After that you can click “Review + Create”, although there are lot of other things which can be filled in but sake of simplicity I will just leave them as is.
5. Once on the Review tab, click “Create” to create the Virtual Machine. It will start the deployment process and might take 10 minutes. You can check the progress while it deploys.
6. After creation you can check the Virtual Machine in the list, click on the name to access it.
7. Click on the name and you will get to a window as show below, to connect to the machine we should RDP it, so click Connect and chose RDP. It will download a file which can be used to connect to machine using the Admin account you have created. This finishes step for creating Virtual Machine.
Add domain servcies to Virtual Machine
Initially I had thought that this steps is not needed but it does not work if Virtual Machine is not connected to a domain, you will get an error at the end of SharePoint 2019 installation that is Search Service Application will not be created successfully. You may get errors like below
The SDDL string contains an invalid sid or a sid that cannot be translated.Parameter name: sddlFormSystem.ArgumentException: The SDDL string contains an invalid sid or a sid that cannot be translated.Parameter name: sddlForm at System.Security.AccessControl.RawSecurityDescriptor.BinaryFormFromSddlForm(String sddlForm) at System.Security.AccessControl.RawSecurityDescriptor..ctor(String sddlForm) at
Errors were encountered during the configuration of the Search Service Application. System.ArgumentException: The SDDL string contains an invalid sid or a sid that cannot be translated. Parameter name: sddlForm at System.Security.AccessControl.RawSecurityDescriptor.BinaryFormFromSddlForm(String sddlForm) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Win32.SPNetApi32.CreateFileShareWithSecurity(String name, String description, String path, String sddl) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Admi.nistration.AnalyticsAdministration.CreateAnalyticsUNCShare(String dirParentLocation, String shareName) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.AnalyticsAdministration.ProvisionAnalyticsShare(SearchServiceApplication serviceApplication) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.AnalyticsAdministration.CreateDefaultStoreLocation(SearchServiceApplication serviceApplication) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.AnalyticsAdministration.ProvisionRawEventStore(SearchServiceApplication serviceApplication) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.AnalyticsServiceAdministration.Provision() at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchServiceApplication.Provision() at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchAdminUtils.UpdateIgnoreSPUpdatedConcurrencyException(String description, SearchAdminUtilsUpdateDelegate updateDelegate, SearchAdminUtilsRefreshObjectDelegate refreshObjectDelegate) at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchConfigWizard.CreateSearchApp() at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchConfigWizard.ProvisionSearchServiceApplication() at Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchConfigurationJobDefinition.ExecuteTimerJob()
To add a domain follow steps listed in the article which is very detailed https://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/12370.windows-server-2012-set-up-your-first-domain-controller-step-by-step.aspx
Once that is done you have got rid of other error which will come as now you will be using a domain account and not local account to install SharePoint 2019.
The specified user “username” is a local account. Local accounts should only be used in standalone mode.
Check SQL Server settings :
- Open SQL Server Management Studio which should be installed already as we had got server with SQL server already installed.
- The account which will install SharePoint 2019 should have required access like below, this account is same as what you had created while creatin Virtual Machine. You can find it under Logins and make sure you have selected “dbcreator” and “securityadmin”. This will make sure the account has correct access to create databases while installing SharePoint 2019.
3. Another thing we need to do is to make sure the account which you updated above has name as “domain\username”, initially it will have name as “computername\username”, since we when we created Virtual Machine with SQL server there was no domain it will remain as is. If you miss this step then you will have issues while creating Search Service Application. So remember to change name as suggested by right clicking and rename. Error message while installing SharePoint 2019 will be like below
The service application “Search Service Application” could not be created because of the following error: System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException (0x80131904): Windows NT user or group
If you are installing in SharePoint 2019 for Production usage make sure you plan for accounts properly, read more here https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/security-for-sharepoint-server/plan-for-administrative-and-service-accounts
Install SharePoint 2019: so finally let’s get started with SharePoint 2019 installation.
- Login to Azure Virtual Machine.
- Download SharePoint 2019 from here : https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=57462
- Once downloaded first step is to install pre-requisites, make sure you have an internet connection else it will not work. Click on “Pre-Requisites”, you will the installation happening
4. Once that is done successfully double click “setup” to installing SharePoint 2019, it will start the installation, check pictures below to understand the steps, in the step 2 make sure you use the same account you had created before with format as “domain\username”, in step 3 select “Single Farm”.
Once the above steps are done a IE window will open to configure further, you can chose to perform rest of the steps manually or run the wizard, I chose to run wizard.
So this should finish your SharePoint 2019 installation and you are ready to use it.
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Kislay Sinha 