TFS 2008 Team Explorer Troubleshooting Guide MSDN

One of my major issues with information on the web is broken/missing links, and when I find something that I consider to be valuable I will post it to ensure the information is available at a later date. The troubleshooting guide posted on the Microsoft TFS Forums is one of them.

UPDATED GUIDE: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd266793.aspx

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/tfssetup/thread/3a12e39a-53c5-4a8c-bdaa-a3152371f76a

If you’ve had problems installing TFS or Team Explorer (TFC) 2008, or upgrading to TFS 2008 from TFS 2005, you’ve come to the right place for help. There’s also some help for trouble with TFS 2008 SP1.

Known issues with solutions/workarounds:

General

1. Problem: You receive an error message “TF220059: An error occurred querying the current settings from your existing Team Foundation Server database”
   Solution: There are several common causes for this error:
   1. The DT has the firewall enabled and no exceptions are set for SQL server.
   2. You specified the data tier server name but not the instance name, and you’re using a non-default SQL instance. Specify this as serverinstance, e.g. “MyDBServerTfsInstance”.
   3. SQL Reporting Services or SQL Analysis Services is not installed or not running. These components may be on the AT, DT, or separate machines (RS is typically on the AT, and AS typically on the DT). Ensure these services are installed, running, and set to automatic.

2. Problem: Error in the logs during repair:

   ERROR: Unhandled exception causing exit: No mapping between account names and security IDs was done.

   Solution:

   Re-create the app pool, set the identity to the same user, re-run repair.

3. Problem: At the end of the installation/repair/uninstall, the wizard does not display any buttons (e.g. Finish)
   Solution: Move the mouse over the bottom section of the wizard (where you’d expect to find the button) and the button should draw in.

4. Problem: When upgrading from TFS 2008 Workgroup Edition to TFS Standard Edition via Add/Remove Programs, you will find that the product key field is greyed out and thus you are blocked from upgrading – this is not “by design”.
   Solution: Run setup from the media (rather than Add/Remove Programs) and the ID field will not be read-only.  Alternatively, you can uninstall Workgroup Edition and then install Standard Edition.

5. Problem: TFS install fails, MSI log contains message: “ConfigureUsers:  Error 0x80070005: Failed to check existence of domain: <machine or domain name>, user: <setup or service account>”
   Solution: There are several possible causes, based partly on the details in the error message:
   1. If your domain is shown as the first parameter, your TFS server may have trouble contact or receiving a response from your domain controller.
   2. If the name in the first parameter is not your domain, but rather one of your domain controllers, there are two known possible causes:
   2a. There is a dns/routing problem between the TFS server and the listed DC. In this case, check network settings including DNS suffixes; you can try adding a hosts entry for the DC’s IP address as a test/workaround.
   2b. There is a domain trust issue dealing with either the setup or service account and the domains they belong to. Installing as a Domain Admin is known to work around this issue but may not be a viable solution. Check with a domain admin and confirm there is full trust between the domains to which the setup and service accounts belong.

Longhorn Server (Windows Server 2008)

1. Problem: Error 32000.The Commandline ‘”D:UsersVSEQA1AppDataLocalTempConfigIIS.exe” -action:createvdir -nameervices “-site:Team Foundation Server” “-pool:Microsoft Team Foundation Server Application Pool” “-path:Program FilesMicrosoft Visual Studio 2008 Team Foundation ServerWeb ServicesServices”‘ returned non-zero value: 100
   Solution (Note: This will probably be fixed in the RTM version of LHS.):
   1. Launch elevated command prompt
   2. Run notepad %windir%System32inetsrvconfigapplicationHost.config
   3. Remove the following section:
      <location path=”Team Foundation Server/Services”>
      </location>
      <location path=”Team Foundation Server/Warehouse”>
      </location>
      <location path=”Team Foundation Server/Build”>
      </location>
      <location path=”Team Foundation Server/WorkItemTracking”>
      </location>
      <location path=”Team Foundation Server/VersionControl”>
      </location>
   4. Save the file
   5. Execute iisreset
   6. Click retry on the TFS error message
2. Problem: Unable to install SQL 2005 RS on a LHS (Windows Server 2008) machine; SQL installer reports that IIS is not installed even though it is. May also surface as TF22059 issue above if you finished the SQL 2005 install and didn’t realize RS was not installed.
   Solution: SQL 2005’s installer is not IIS7-aware. If the optional IIS7 components that RS requires are not installed, SQL setup will report IIS is not installed, and if you complete the SQL installation, RS will not be included. The required features of IIS7 include (but may not be limited to): HTTP Redirection, Windows Authentication, and all of the IIS6 Management Compatibility features.
3. Problem: Unable to install SharePoint 3.0 on LHS.
   Solution: You need WSS3 with sp1. You can download the version with sp1 included here: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=106433

Also note that if you run SQL 2005 on LHS, you need to apply sp2 (or later) to SQL Server.

SQL Reporting Services

1. Problem: Errors relating to Reporting Services during TFS install/upgrade; Browsing http://<server>/Reports gives an error about a login failure (e.g. for NT AuthorityAnonymous Login).
   Solution:
   1. In the SQL Reporting Services Configuration tool, verify what identity RS is currently configured to access the database with – typically, Network Service.
   2. In the ReportServer and ReportServerTempDB databases, view roles and verify that the account above is a member of the RSExecRole. In a single-server setup, this should show up as “NT AuthorityNetwork Service”. In a dual-server setup (or any configuration where RS and the databases are not on the same machine), it should show up as “DomainRS_Machine$”. For example, if your domain name is Contoso and your RS installation is on TFSAT, verify that ContosoTFSAT$ is in the RSExecRole.

We’ll add to these over time based on feedback, bug reports, other forum threads, etc.

Where are the log files?

1. Look in both %temp% and %temp%.. (the parent dir of %temp%).  It’s a long story why that’s the case, but it’s still that way in Orcas (TFS 2008) as well.
2. Sort based on Date Modified descending so the files written to most recently are at the top
3. dd_install_vstf*.txt and vsmsi*.txt are the ones that will be most helpful in the 95% case, with dd_depcheck*.txt useful on those other occasions where we’re having version number issues (this tends to affect us more internally than it does external customers)
4. TFS is dd_install_vstf_at*.txt; Team Explorer (TFC) is dd_install_vstf_tfc*.txt.
5. Note: If you have trouble applying TFS 2008 SP1, there are additional details in the SP1 log, which can be found in the same folders as above, but the filename will be something like “Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 2008…MSI0.txt”

What am I looking for in the log files?

The log files can be cryptic and misleading at times. Here are some tips on how to find the most relevant parts:

1. The dd_*.txt files are cumulative – so you probably want to start at or near the end if you’ve run setup more than once.
2. In dd_*.txt, searching for “ERRORLOG EVENT” is a good place to start – however, note that you’ll usually see several of these, and they aren’t all serious problems.
3. VSMSI*.txt – there is one of these for each time setup reaches the progress bar page (roughly). Look for the newest VSMSI*.txt file to find the log for the most recent attempt.
4. Within that VSMSI file, generally start at the end (especially if you haven’t canceled setup yet – otherwise, you’ll still have to scroll up a bit).
5. Remember that if you fail and/or cancel before you reach the progress bar page, you won’t get a VSMSI*.txt file.

Can someone from Microsoft look at my log files?

Sure! If you are hitting problems, first, please search the forums for similar errors/failures (you may want to use a general search engine scoped to forums.microsoft.com in addition to the forum’s built-in search feature – e.g. “Search Terms site:forums.microsoft.com” on both Live and Google search).

If you find a matching thread, see if any information in that thread unblocks you.  If you don’t find a matching thread, follow these steps:

1. Start a thread describing the problem you are seeing.  This is the only way to get a response.  Include in the thread as much relevant information as possible.  Include the text of any error messages you are seeing.
2. Send an email to tfsb2sup@microsoft.com. with the following required information:
   • Attached log files (as described above)
   • A link to the new forum thread you created in step 1.
   • Your forum username
   • A subject line such as “log files for thread XYZ”  to help us respond more quickly.
3. Your email address and any personally-identifiable information in the logs are protected by the Microsoft Data Collection Policy (http://privacy.microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx). If you feel this is inadequate, be sure to scrub any machine names, user names, etc. from the log files before you send them.

Bear in mind that this is part of the forum’s “best effort” level of support. If you have an emergency or need turnaround in a predictable timeframe, please engage official Microsoft Product Support Services (http://support.microsoft.com/ph/9488).

In addition to helping you get unblocked, your experience and feedback will help us improve the setup experience for TFS in this and future releases.