Difference between Service Packs , Cumulative updates, Public Updates and Security Updates

Service Pack

A tested, cumulative set of all hotfixes, security updates, critical updates, and updates. Additionally, service packs may contain additional fixes for problems that are found internally since the release of the product. Service packs my also contain a limited number of customer-requested design changes or features.

What is included: new fixes, new functionality, all previously released fixes (older Service Packs, CUs, PUs)

Cumulative Update (CU)

A Cumulative Update includes fixes for problems with our product that have been reported by customer in context of support cases.

What is included: new and all previously released fixes (CUs and PUs) since the oldest supported service pack (within the first 12 month after a Service Pack has been released the CU includes also fixes released after the previous service pack)

Public Update (PU)

A Public Update usually includes security fixes for the product or fixes for problems which affect a broad number of customers.

What is included: Review the KB article for each public update in detail to see which fixes are included.

Security Update

A widely released fix for a product-specific, security-related vulnerability. Security vulnerabilities are rated by their severity. The severity rating is indicated in the Microsoft security bulletin as critical, important, moderate, or low.

References : 1, 2

How to create a SharePoint Subscription Settings Service application through PowerShell

This example assumes that a managed account for DOMAIN\ManagedAccount already exists. 

$AppPool = New-SPServiceApplicationPool -Name SettingsServiceAppPool -Account (Get-SPManagedAccount DOMAIN\ManagedAccount)

$App = New-SPSubscriptionSettingsServiceApplication -ApplicationPool $appPool -Name SettingsServiceApp -DatabaseName SettingsServiceDB

$proxy = New-SPSubscriptionSettingsServiceApplicationProxy -ServiceApplication $App

Get-SPServiceInstance | where{$_.TypeName -eq "Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Subscription Settings Service"} | Start-SPServiceInstance

This example creates

- an application pool

- a new subscription settings service application

- a subscription settings service application proxy

- and starts the service instance on the local machine. 

SharePoint Developer Dashboard

Developer Dashboard is a great feature on SharePoint 2010. This feature is disabled by default. And it provides performance and tracing information that can be used to debug and troubleshoot page rendering time issues. (slow page loads, web part issues, query delays) .Enabling this great feature will get critical information about execution time, log correlation ID, critical events, database queries, service calls, SPRequests allocation and webpart events offsets.

The Developer Dashboard feature is turned off by default, but it can be enabled very easy via stsadm or PowerShell.

Check status of Developer Dashboard

stsadm -o getproperty -pn developer-dashboard

Enable Developer Dashboard via stsadm:

‘On’ Mode:

stsadm -o setproperty -pn developer-dashboard -pv On

‘OnDemand’ Mode:

stsadm -o setproperty -pn developer-dashboard -pv OnDemand

Disable Developer Dashboard via stsadm:

stsadm -o setproperty -pn developer-dashboard -pv Off

How to Implement Hold and eDiscovery in a SharePoint Site

Adding a Hold to a Record

1) Browse to the Site Settings

2) Manage Site Features -> Hold and eDiscovery -> Activate

3) This will display the Hold and eDiscovery section in Site settings now.

4) Browse to Holds list and create a new item (Hold)

5) Now browse to a document library and select a document, right click and choose Compliance Details.

6) This will show the Hold status of the document. Choose Add/Remove from hold

7) Select Add to a hold and Save. Use the drop-down selection box to choose the relevant hold to apply to this record.  The ‘Comments’ field is not required.

8) Now check the Compliance Details. This shows that the document is On hold.If you noticed, now the Delete option is not available( and will not be available as long as the Hold is in place)

Note:

a. This means this record cannot be deleted and will not be destroyed through its Information Management Policy until the new hold is removed.

b. Please note that SharePoint allows you to apply multiple holds to the same record.  If a record has multiple holds applied to it, SharePoint will not allow the record to be destroyed until all the holds are removed.

Removing a Hold from a Record

1) Browse to a document library and select a document, right click and choose Compliance Details

2) This will show the Hold status of the document (On hold). Choose Add/Remove from hold

3) Select Remove from a hold and Save. Use the drop-down selection box to choose the relevant hold to apply to this record.  The ‘Comments’ field is not required.

4) Now you should be able to delete the record

SharePoint Hold and eDiscovery feature

The Hold and eDiscovery feature of SharePoint sites prevents items such as documents, images, pages, from expiration policies. This feature is typically used for items that are subject to events such as litigation, audits, or investigations.

Organizations use holds to prevent items that may be relevant to ongoing litigation or investigation from expiring or being destroyed before the event to which they are relevant has been resolved. Also , when an item is placed on hold , it cannot be edited or deleted.

How Hold works

To use the Hold feature, Hold and eDiscovery feature must be activated in that site.You can add a Holds list to any site by accessing the Site Settings page for the site and activating the Hold and eDiscovery feature.

Note: By default, every Records Center site has a Holds list (feature is already activated)

A new entry is added to the Holds list for creating a new hold. The Holds list provides tools for finding and holding relevant items, viewing items that are currently on hold, or releasing a hold when it is no longer required. When an item is added to a hold, its hold status is updated to indicate that it is on hold, and the application prevents this item from expiring or being deleted. An item can have multiple holds at the same time. If an item is put on multiple holds, it is suspended from its original information management policy until all of the holds to which it has been added are released.

I have detailed the implementation of Hold and eDiscovery feature here.

Reference

SharePoint 2010 User Active Directory Permissions not updating

When you are using Active Directory groups and add those groups into SharePoint groups, you will run into issues while modifying the members of the Active Directory group. It takes 24 hours (by default) to reflect this change to SharePoint.This behavior is controlled by a property called Token-timeout.By default, this value is set to 1440 minutes (24 hours) .

SharePoint fetches user token information from the SharePoint database. If the user has never visited the site or if the user’s token was generated more than 24 hours previously, SharePoint generates a new user token by trying to refresh the list of groups that the user belongs to.(MSDN Reference)

To check which values you currently have, try running the below:

 stsadm –o getproperty –propertyname token-timeout

If you want to minimize this token time out value (time it takes to refresh the token), follow the below instructions.

To set a valid time to 2000 minutes, use the following syntax:

stsadm -o setproperty -pn token-timeout -pv 2000

Note: You can substitute -pn for -propertyname and -pv for -propertyvalue. 

Name	Value
propertyname	Gets or sets the name of the property.
propertyvalue	A valid time interval, in minutes. The default setting is 1440 minutes.

The syntax for the setproperty operation is:

stsadm -o setproperty -propertyname token-timeout –propertyvalue <A valid time interval, in minutes>

Note:

- This property applies to the entire farm.

- The use of stsadm will only affect the ContentService Web service property and not the AdministrationService Web service property.

Warning: If you set Token-timeout to zero (0) it can bring the farm down and you get this error message
"The context has expired and can no longer be used. Exception from HRESULT: 0x80090317"

Related

Active Directory Group Sync Issue with SharePoint 2013 Permissions

Issue

AD security group permissions are being used to control access in SharePoint 2013, however, changes to group membership in AD are not taking effect immediately in SharePoint 2013. In simple words, even after you remove a user from the AD security group - user is still able to access the site. If you add a new user to the AD security group, user still receives access denied error message in SharePoint.

Workaround - If you need to have the change take effect immediately, you can do an Application Pool recycle for that web application. 

Cause

In Windows Claims enabled web application (the default for SharePoint 2013), the logon token life time is by default 10 hours and cache life time is by default 10 minutes. Hence, the AD group modifications will not reflect immediately in SharePoint user sign-in. internally what happens is when a user accesses a SharePoint site, SharePoint checks the security token store cache for the user's claims. If the claim is found in the cache, SharePoint uses it to authorize the user. If not, SharePoint queries for claims again from the AD.

To check which values you currently have, try running the below:

$sts = Get-SPSecurityTokenServiceConfig
$sts.WindowsTokenLifetime
$sts.LogonTokenCacheExpirationWindow

Resolution

The value of token life time and cache expiration time can be set to the desired value per your needs.Lowering the token life time introduces more round trips to AD to authenticate the user, which means performance characteristics should be monitored to determine the appropriate lifetime.I have seen 10 minutes being recommended to use, but this is something that needs to be tested as it should be considered on a case by case scenario.If you would like to change the token life time, you can use the following PowerShell cmdlet to set the Windows token life time and cache expiration window to the desirable value.

The below example sets your WindowsTokenLifetime to 10minutes (10 hours is the default) and the Cache Expiration to 2 minutes (10 minutes is the default).

$sts = Get-SPSecurityTokenServiceConfig
$sts.WindowsTokenLifetime = "00:10:00"
$sts.LogonTokenCacheExpirationWindow = (New-TimeSpan –minutes 2)
$sts.Update()
iisreset 

Warning

If you set Token lifetime lesser than the token expiration window, you get this error message

"The context has expired and can no longer be used. Exception from HRESULT: 0x80090317"

Get-SPSecurityTokenServiceConfig

Set-SPSecurityTokenServiceConfig

Related

SharePoint Major Version and Minor Version

A major version is usually one that represents a milestone, such as completion of an outline or a chapter. Major versions are numbered with whole numbers, such as 3.0, 4.0, and so on.

A minor version represents interim check-ins while a particular file is under development. Minor versions are numbered with decimals, such as 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, and so on.

In many organizations, versioning is set up so that only the owner of the file and people who can approve items can see minor versions. In others, it is set up so that anyone who can edit files in the library, or anyone who has Read permission to the library, can see all versions.

Note: Major and minor versions are available in libraries, but not in lists.

Limiting the number of versions is generally a good practice. It means you can conserve space on the server and reduce clutter for users. But, if your organization is required to save all versions for legal or other reasons, do not apply any limits.

• When you check out a file in a versioning-enabled library, a new version is created every time you check it back in. And, if major and minor versions are part of the configuration of your library, you can designate, at check-in, which type of version you are checking in. In libraries where check-out is required, versions are only created upon check-in.

• In libraries where check-out is not required, a new version is created the first time you save after opening the file. Each subsequent save overwrites the version that you created with the first save. If you close the application and then reopen the document, the first save will, once again, produce a version. This can cause the number of versions to proliferate very rapidly.

How to View a file or item from previous version

If you need to view an older version of an item or file, you can select the older version and “view” it so that it becomes the current version.

1. Navigate to the list or library where your item or file is located.

2. Hover over the item or file for which you want to manage versions until you see a drop-down arrow.

3. Click the drop-down arrow and select Version History.

4. Hover over the version that you want to view and select the document.
5. This will display the document with that particular version.

How to Delete a previous version

If you need to make sure that no one can read a version that has inaccurate or otherwise troublesome information, you can delete it.

1. Navigate to the list or library where your item or file is located.

2. Hover over the item or file for which you want to manage versions until you see a drop-down arrow.

3. Click the drop-down arrow and select Version History.

4. Hover over the version that you want to delete until you see a drop-down arrow.

5. Click the drop-down arrow and select Delete.

6. When you are prompted to confirm the deletion, click OK.

Note: When you delete a version, it is sent to the Recycle Bin, where you, or another person who has the necessary permissions, can recover it. If you do not see the Recycle Bin on your site, your server administrator might have disabled it.

How to Restore a file or item from previous version

If you need an older version of an item or file, you can select the older version and “restore” it so that it becomes the current version.

1. Navigate to the list or library where your item or file is located.

2. Hover over the item or file for which you want to manage versions until you see a drop-down arrow.

3. Click the drop-down arrow and select Version History.

4. Hover over the version that you want to restore until you see a drop-down arrow.

5. Click the drop-down arrow and select Restore.

6. When you are prompted to confirm the restoration as your current version, click OK.

SharePoint Versioning

Versioning is available for list items in all default list types—including calendars, issue tracking lists, and custom lists. It is also available for all file types that can be stored in libraries, including Web Part pages.

Versioning helps us with the following:

Track history of a version - When versioning is enabled, you can see when an item or file was changed and who changed it. You can also see when properties (information about the file) were changed. For example, if someone changes the due date of a list item, that information appears in the version history. You can also see the comments people make when they check files into libraries.

Restore a previous version - If you made a mistake in a current version, if the current version is corrupt, or if you simply like a previous version better, you can replace the current version with a previous one. The “restored” version becomes the new current version.

View a previous version - You can view a previous version without overwriting your current version. If you are viewing version history within a Microsoft Office document, such as a Word or Excel file, you can compare the two versions to determine what the differences are.

To do this…	I need this permission…
View version history	Full Control, Contribute, Read
Restore a previous version	Full Control, Contribute
Delete a version	Full Control, Contribute
Unpublish a version	Full Control, Contribute
Recover deleted a deleted version (30 days)	Full control and/or Contribute

There has been a critical error while processing the form.

Issue Description

You get the below error message when you use InfoPath Forms on SharePoint 2010 and Internet Explorer 11.

Critical Error

There has been a critical error while processing the form.  

Click Start Over to load a new copy of the form. If this error persists, contact the support team for the Web site.

Click Close to exit this message.

Object doesn't support property or method 'addEventListener'

Fix

There is an incompatibility with some SharePoint 2010 features and Internet Explorer 11.

To fix this, IE needs to run on Enterprise Mode.

Open Internet Explorer -> Right Click Enable Menu bar -> Tools - > Select Enterprise Mode

SharePoint Group - Site Owner (Full Control)

When a SharePoint site is created, by default 3 SharePoint groups are created

Site Owners - Full control

Site Members - Contribute

Site Visitors - Read

Below are the permissions you get when you are a Site Owner (Full Control)

List Permissions

Manage Lists - Create and delete lists, add or remove columns in a list, and add or remove public views of a list.

Override Check Out - Discard or check in a document which is checked out to another user.

Add Items - Add items to lists and add documents to document libraries.

Edit Items - Edit items in lists, edit documents in document libraries, and customize Web Part Pages in document libraries.

Delete Items - Delete items from a list and documents from a document library.

View Items - View items in lists and documents in document libraries.

Approve Items - Approve a minor version of a list item or document.

Open Items - View the source of documents with server-side file handlers.

View Versions - View past versions of a list item or document.

Delete Versions - Delete past versions of a list item or document.

Create Alerts - Create alerts.

View Application Pages - View forms, views, and application pages. Enumerate lists.

Site Permissions

Manage Permissions - Create and change permission levels on the Web site and assign permissions to users and groups.

View Web Analytics Data - View reports on Web site usage.

Create Subsites - Create subsites such as team sites, Meeting Workspace sites, and Document Workspace sites.

Manage Web Site - Grants the ability to perform all administration tasks for the Web site as well as manage content.

Add and Customize Pages - Add, change, or delete HTML pages or Web Part Pages, and edit the Web site using a Microsoft SharePoint Foundation-compatible editor.

Apply Themes and Borders - Apply a theme or borders to the entire Web site.

Apply Style Sheets - Apply a style sheet (.CSS file) to the Web site.

Create Groups - Create a group of users that can be used anywhere within the site collection.

Browse Directories - Enumerate files and folders in a Web site using SharePoint Designer and Web DAV interfaces.

View Pages - View pages in a Web site.

Enumerate Permissions - Enumerate permissions on the Web site, list, folder, document, or list item.

Browse User Information - View information about users of the Web site.

Manage Alerts - Manage alerts for all users of the Web site.

Use Remote Interfaces - Use SOAP, Web DAV, the Client Object Model or SharePoint Designer interfaces to access the Web site.

Use Client Integration Features - Use features which launch client applications. Without this permission, users will have to work on documents locally and upload their changes.

Open - Allows users to open a Web site, list, or folder in order to access items inside that container.

Edit Personal User Information - Allows a user to change his or her own user information, such as adding a picture.

Personal Permissions

Manage Personal Views - Create, change, and delete personal views of lists.

Add/Remove Personal Web Parts - Add or remove personal Web Parts on a Web Part Page.

Update Personal Web Parts - Update Web Parts to display personalized information.

SharePoint Group - Site Member (Contribute)

When a SharePoint site is created, by default 3 SharePoint groups are created

Site Owners - Full control

Site Members - Contribute

Site Visitors - Read

Below are the permissions you get when you are a Site Member (Contribute)

List Permissions

Add Items - Add items to lists and add documents to document libraries.

Edit Items - Edit items in lists, edit documents in document libraries, and customize Web Part Pages in document libraries.

Delete Items - Delete items from a list and documents from a document library.

View Items - View items in lists and documents in document libraries.

Open Items - View the source of documents with server-side file handlers.

View Versions - View past versions of a list item or document.

Delete Versions - Delete past versions of a list item or document.

Create Alerts - Create alerts.

View Application Pages - View forms, views, and application pages. Enumerate lists.

Site Permissions

Browse Directories - Enumerate files and folders in a Web site using SharePoint Designer and Web DAV interfaces.

View Pages - View pages in a Web site.

Browse User Information - View information about users of the Web site.

Use Remote Interfaces - Use SOAP, Web DAV, the Client Object Model or SharePoint Designer interfaces to access the Web site.

Use Client Integration Features - Use features which launch client applications. Without this permission, users will have to work on documents locally and upload their changes.

Open - Allows users to open a Web site, list, or folder in order to access items inside that container.

Edit Personal User Information - Allows a user to change his or her own user information, such as adding a picture.

Personal Permissions

Manage Personal Views - Create, change, and delete personal views of lists.

Add/Remove Personal Web Parts - Add or remove personal Web Parts on a Web Part Page.

Update Personal Web Parts - Update Web Parts to display personalized information.

SharePoint Group - Site Visitor (Read)

When a SharePoint site is created, by default 3 SharePoint groups are created

Site Owners - Full control

Site Members - Contribute

Site Visitors - Read

Below are the permissions you get when you are a Site Visitor (Read)

List Permissions

View Items - View items in lists and documents in document libraries.

Open Items - View the source of documents with server-side file handlers.

View Versions - View past versions of a list item or document.

Create Alerts - Create alerts.

View Application Pages - View forms, views, and application pages. Enumerate lists.

Site Permissions

View Pages - View pages in a Web site.

Browse User Information - View information about users of the Web site.

Use Remote Interfaces - Use SOAP, Web DAV, the Client Object Model or SharePoint Designer interfaces to access the Web site.

Use Client Integration Features - Use features which launch client applications. Without this permission, users will have to work on documents locally and upload their changes.

Open - Allows users to open a Web site, list, or folder in order to access items inside that container.