SharePoint 2013 OWA: Server Error: We're sorry. An Error has occurred. We've logged the error for the server administrator

User reported that few excels files are no longer opening to them. I could reproduce the issue in reported library and then verified other documents in the same library but different folder. It was opening as expected without a glitch. Same time i have verified other documents hosted in other sites on the same farm.

Jumped into server to see if anything weird over OWA servers. From event logs/application logs, there is nothing report unusual. Trust me i got recommendation from all articles only on OWA repair/detach OWA etc, from which my situtation differs. its not spreaded across farm, just a library in a site :S

Now its clear, that issue is only with particular folder/library. The library found to have too many folder structure and excels files in it.

Resolution:

As i mentioned before, i could see so many excel files in the library and  it has number of items to display set to 100 items per page.

I changed this to 50 and thats works like gem :)

To limit list view items:

(i) On list/Library , from the top ribbon bar, under Library click on Modify view

(ii) Scroll down till "Item Limit" , where we can limit "Number of items to display"

Missing Design Manager from site settings ?

                    One of the user with Full control reported that he couldn't see "Design Manager " from Site settings.Thought this would be because of some Permission issue and so I have created Group called "Designer " at site level, assigned with Design Permission. Still he is facing same issue.

Only then I have noticed that even for admins "Design Manager" is not available for this site.

Resolution:

Activate the below listed features :

(i) SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure --> Site collection Features
(ii) SharePoint Server Publishing --> Site Features

Now you should be able to see Design Manager. In my case, I could see as a admin but not my user.

Finally it works when I have provided him with Design permission at site collection.

Site Feed Webpart is missing

I came across this situation when trying to add Site Feed WebPart. By default this web part would be added to the site when created. By then I was not interested in newsfeed and removed it.

Now I wanted to have in my site, but when I tried I don't see under Social Collaboration or any other group.

Here we have two cases:

(i) Activate Site Feed feature from Site features

  Site Settings--> Manage Site Features--> Enable "Site Feed"

If you found to have this feature activated already and still you are missing Site Feed Web part (like me). Then comes this Question for you, "Have you migrated/upgraded your sites recently?", not the new site created in 2013.

If Yes, then you have similar case like me. Here you go with detailed steps to bring Site Feed ON:

(i) Navigate to Site collection Administration page
(ii) Web Designer Galleries --> Web Parts
(iii) Check for Site Feed, which you wont see there now
(iv) Click on New Document, scroll down and search for
"Microsoft.SharePoint.Portal.WebControls.SiteFeedWebPart"
(v) Select by clicking check box beside it
(vi) scroll up and click on "Populate Gallery"

Now it will be available in Web part Galleries as "SiteFeedWebPart.dwp". You can search and edit the properties to group as you wish(I prefer Social Collaboration for easy access across sub sites).

Finally I was able to get site Feed webpart for any subsite :D

Unable to display this Web Part. To troubleshoot the problem, open this Web page in a Microsoft SharePoint Foundation-compatible HTML editor such as Microsoft SharePoint Designer. If the problem persists, contact your Web server administrator

We had a custom webpart deployed in the SharePoint page. Faced this issue when loading the page and same was working before.

Error found in Event log:

System.StackOverflowException: Operation caused a stack overflow.
at Microsoft.Xslt.NativeMethod.CheckForSufficientStack()
at dvt_groupfield(XmlQueryRuntime )
at <xsl:template name="dvt_1.body">(XmlQueryRuntime , IList`1 , Double , XPathNavigator )
at <xsl:template name="dvt_1">(XmlQueryRuntime , XPathNavigator )
at Root(XmlQueryRuntime )
at Execute(XmlQueryRuntime )
at System.Xml.Xsl.XmlILCommand.Execute(Object defaultDocument, XmlResolver dataSources, XsltArgumentList argumentList, XmlWriter writer)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages.DataFormWebPart.ApplyXslTransform(XPathNavigator dataNavigator, XslCompiledTransform xslCompiledTransform, XsltArgumentList xmlArguments)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages.DataFormWebPart.ExecuteTransform(XslCompiledTransform xslCompiledTransform, XsltArgumentList xmlArguments, Boolean bDeferExecuteTransform)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages.DataFormWebPart.PrepareAndPerformTransform(Boolean bDeferExecuteTransform)

Reason:

This issue occurs when the query took longer than one 1 second to complete as normally XsltTransformTimeOut set to 1 in SP2013 farm.

To get your Timeout interval:

PS U:\> $farm=Get-SPFarm
PS U:\> $farm.XsltTransformTimeOut

we got value returned as 1

Increase timeout interval to fix this issue:

PS U:\> $farm=Get-SPFarm
PS U:\> $farm.XsltTransformTimeOut=20
PS U:\> $farm.update

You can also update to 5 and monitor for few days, if it is observed to be fine, then you can have 5 seconds as interval



$farm=Get-SPFarm
$farm.XsltTransformTimeOut=5
$farm.update

SharePoint Admin quick access Guide

Sometimes we feel like clicking too many links to get information what we need actually Or with high level customization sometimes we will not be able to find Site Settings symbol, sign in as different user etc. At times, with high level look and feel change, we will not be able to find SharePoint version.
Being an Admin we should be having all basic information. We should have shortcut to get those information quickly. I have jotted down few necessary URLs to get into site really quickly.

Add these listed part at the end of your URL to get Quick access. Eg.: https://sharepoint.org.com/subsites/addthislistedpart

Handy URL List:

Sign in as Different User:

/_layouts/closeConnection.aspx?loginasanotheruser=true

SharePoint Version:

/_vti_pvt/Service.cnf → Result will show you 12 or 14 or15 , which is MOSS or 2010 or 2013 respectively.

Webpart Gallery:

/_catalogs/wp

List Template Gallery:

/_catalogs/lt

Master Page Gallery:

/_catalogs/masterpage

Solution Gallery:

/_catalogs/solutions

Recycle Bin:
/_layouts/recyclebin.aspx

Admin Recycle Bin:

/_layouts/adminrecyclebin.aspx

Manage Subsites and Workspaces:

/_layouts/mngsubwebs.aspx

Manage Site Permission:

/_layouts/user.aspx

People and group:

/_layouts/people.aspx

To get Grid View:
?ShowInGrid=True

Quick Launch Settings Page:

/_layouts/quiklnch.aspx

Navigation Settings Page:

/_layouts/15/AreaNavigationSettings.aspx

Manage Site Features:

/_layouts/ManageFeatures.aspx

Save as Site Template:
/_layouts/savetmpl.aspx

Taxonomy Hidden List URL:
Applicable only to site collection. All authenticated users will have Read access to this list.

Lists/TaxonomyHiddenList/AllItems.aspx

Workflow History:
/lists/Workflow%20History

Welcome Page:
/_layouts/AreaWelcomePage.aspx

Page Layouts and Site Templates:
/_Layouts/AreaTemplateSettings.aspx

Issue with Incoming email - "Unable to deliver message. No such domain"

Here is the case, we were so confident with our SMTP configuration and users were happy except one , you will come to know WHY??

We had enabled incoming email option for a library and so we have communicated users with the appropriate email address for that library.E.g.: Reports@lib.org.com. Users were able to send and receive emails to the SharePoint library. Same we have tested from our end.

The other user had reported and emailed me with the supporting error messages. It clearly says "Unable to deliver message. No such domain", which is not true. We are able to receive emails in the library still.

User has sent an email with the attachment of 16 MB file to the correct email address and a bounce back email with the above error in his inbox(Same for us - admin). To the same email address, if we sent an email with/without attachment but of size less than 10 MB, we were able to see emails in the document library.

From the server end, the file didn't reached the DROP(C:\inetpub\mailroot\Drop) folder in the email configured SharePoint Server. Whereas the other files received in QUEUE, then DROP and updated perfectly in the site.

You can check your email header, in my case it clearly says that the file was not out of Exchange. To access email header, open your delivery status email→File→Info→Properties, here you can see internet header, where you can track your email.

The issue is now narrow downed to Email size, since we were able to send email less than 10 MB and not the 16 MB file. Its is already out of my email box and struck with exchange(got it from header). so nothing to do with my mail box.

Again into the SMTP configured SharePoint Server and looking to change the email size limit. Open IIS 6.0 not the IIS manager to check SMTP properties, expand server name and right click on the SMTP virtual server→On properties Window → Under "Message" tab you will see limit information.

I changed it to maximum size but still no luck in fixing this issue.

There is someting called Send Connector, through which emails can sent to SharePoint server. By default it would be 10 MB. Working with Exchange team, from exchange management console, we changed the default value to 20 MB. Wait for 2 to 3 hrs and worked for me!!

Email Success and Happy users 😃

OOB Approval Workflow 2010 got cancelled with any permission level

This is my first post 😍 and about OOB workflow issue !! Lets see whats the issue & how we fixed it

Issue Description: We have migrated our MOSS sites to SharePoint 2013 sites recently and post migration check was success full from business end. But this verification missed to run the OOB approval 2010 workflow which was added to a library(other sites & other Workflows are running as expected).

When we run the Approval workflow on any of the documents from that library, it got cancelled with this message "The workflow could not update the item, possibly because one or more columns for the item require a different type of information". Also, approver added to the TO field didn't receive any emails regarding this workflow.


Steps we tried without luck:

1. Created new library and added Approval 2010 workflow, to reproduce this issue. Plan is to recreate the Approval Workflow if it worked in new library. I could reproduce the same issue with the new library too.

2. De-activated Workflow feature from the site collection and activated it.

3. Now when i created new library with same settings and an approval workflow, it works like a charm.

My library settings are here:

Version Enabled, Content types Enabled and Content Approval Enabled.
My Workflow Settings:

Start Options: Manual and to approve publishing a major version of an item.

Enabled Options in Next Page: Expand Groups , End on Document Change , Enable Content Approval

4. So i deleted the workflow which i created in Step 1 and added new workflow, that works with new library.

5. Tried the same with the reported library and this time it was not positive. End up with same issue. 😣
6. Deleted all the Approval Workflows added to that library and tried with new approval workflow. Got to face same issue.

Clearly we got to know that workflow associated with that library got corrupted.

From the ULS log:

12/20/2016 14:39:09.86 w3wp.exe (Servername:0x28E8) 0x3444 SharePoint Foundation Legacy Workflow Infrastructure 72er Medium System.UnauthorizedAccessException: Attempted to perform an unauthorized operation. at Microsoft.SharePoint.Workflow.SPWinOEWSSService.UpdateModerationStatus(Guid id, Guid listId, SPItemKey itemKey, SPModerationStatusType newModerationStatus, String comments) 2602c39d-a804-107d-3186-931a0a42b767

Steps to Fix the issue:

1. De-activate the Workflow Feature from the site collection

2. Run the below Script:

$sitecollection = get-spsite SiteCollectionURL

$web=$sitecollection.RootWeb
$folder = $web.RootFolder
$catalogs = $folder.SubFolders["_catalogs"]
$wfpub = $catalogs.SubFolders["wfpub"]
$subs = $wfpub.subfolders → this will list the folders under the Workflow pub folder. You will see Approval 2010, Publishing , collect feedback and signature Workflow templates here

Run below delete command alone with above script to delete affceted template:

$wfpub.SubFolders.Delete('Collect Feedback - SharePoint 2010')
$wfpub.SubFolders.Delete('Approval - SharePoint 2010')
$wfpub.SubFolders.Delete('Collect Signatures - SharePoint 2010')

3. After deleting the Workflow templates, activate Workflow feature from the Site Collection

enable-spfeature -url URL -identity workflows

This fixed the issue on that affected library and able to run new workflow without any issue.