Error - “The given key was not present in the dictionary."

PowerShell command to delete the query suggestion automatically added by SharePoint(suggestions are automatically built based on what search results are actually clicked on. It takes 6 clicks within a year for SharePoint to add a suggestion)), returns an error

Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase -SearchApplication "SharePoint Server Search" -Language En-Us -Type QuerySuggestionAlwaysSuggest -Identity "ford"

Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase : The given key was not present in the dictionary.

At line:1 char:48 + Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase <<<<  -SearchApplication "SharePoint Server Search" -Language En-Us -Type QuerySuggestionAlwaysSuggest -Identity ford

    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidData: (Microsoft.Offic...eResourcePhrase:   RemoveSearchLanguageResourcePhrase) [Remove-SPEnterp...eResourcePhrase], KeyNotFoundException

    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Cmdlet.RemoveSearchLanguageResourcePhrase

I could not find a way to remove a query suggestion added by SharePoint. Maybe it is a bug. But we do have an option to block them. This way we can stop them from appearing on the search box.

To block the query suggestion "ford"

New-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase -SearchApplication $SearchApp -Language en-us -Type QuerySuggestionBlockList -Name “ford”

Start-SPTimerJob -Identity “Prepare query suggestions”

To unblock the Query Suggestions "ford"

Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase -SearchApplication $SearchApp -Language en-Us -Type QuerySuggestionBlockList -Identity “ford”

Start-SPTimerJob -Identity “Prepare query suggestions”

To view the list of blocked Query Suggestions

Get-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase –SearchApplication "SharePoint Server Search" -Language en-us -Type QuerySuggestionBlockList

WARNING: column "Mapping" does not fit into the display and was removed.

Phrase               Type                                        Culture    Author

------               ----                                             -------       ------

ford                 QuerySuggestionBlockList            en-US      domain\user

How to Sync SharePoint Contacts with Outlook

1) Browse to SharePoint site.

2) Go to Site Actions -> More Options… Create ->Select Contacts template.

3) Create the Contacts lists and enter the data there.

4) Next steps ->List Tools -> List -> Connect to Outlook -> Click Allow -> Click Allow

5) This will Sync the SharePoint contacts with Outlook.

6) Now open Outlook -> Contacts. The Contacts would be listed there.

Changes in the SharePoint list would sync in Outlook as well

An unexpected error has occurred when trying to create an Enterprise Search Center in SharePoint 2010

Issue Description

I tried to create a SharePoint Search Center with site template as Enterprise Search Center within a site collection in SharePoint 2010 and got the below error.

Reason

The SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure feature must be activated at the site collection level before creating a site with Enterprise Search Center template.

Resolution

So the next step was to enable the Publishing Infrastructure feature.

1) Go to Site Actions -> Site Settings -> Site collection features -> SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure

2) Click on Activate

Business Intelligence Center site template missing

Issue Description

Recently I was trying to create a SharePoint site based of the BI Center template and noticed that this option was missing.

Resolution

1) Browse to Site collection Features and Activate PerformancePoint Services Site Collection Features

/_layouts/ManageFeatures.aspx?Scope=Site

2) Browse to Site Features and Activate PerformancePoint Services Site Features

/_layouts/ManageFeatures.aspx

User Name is displaying incorrectly in SharePoint

Issue Description

A user's display name is incorrect on a SharePoint site .A user in your organization has recently updated some of his or her information (such as the user's display name) in Active Directory Domain Services. The information was updated correctly in the user Profile Service Application. However, on a specific Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Site Collection, that information was not updated.

Cause

The user is not synchronizing correctly to a Site Collection. This most likely occurs because the user is not flagged as Active on the Site. In Microsoft Office SharePoint 2007, you could remove the user from the All People group and re-add them. This option is no longer available in SharePoint 2010.

Resolution

In simple words – Note the permission of the user in the site. Remove the user from the site and add again. Detailed explanation is below

Important: If you remove the user from the All People group, all the user's permissions to this Site Collection are removed. Before you remove the user's permissions and re-add them, note the user's permissions. To do this, on the Site Actions menu, click Site Permissions, and then click Check Permissions.

The All People group is hidden in SharePoint 2010. However, to access this group, you can modify the following 

URL in the browser:

<Site URL>/_layouts/people.aspx?MembershipGroupId=0

For example, the URL will resemble the following:

https://contoso.com/sites/<SpecificSiteName>/_layouts/people.aspx?MembershipGroupId=0

If you remove the user from this group, this also removes the user from the userInfo table in the Microsoft SQL Server database. When you re-add the user, the user's information is updated in this table.

Reference

Invalid WorkflowInstanceID parameter in URL

When an end user clicked on an View the workflow history from an older email send as a part of a SharePoint Workflow approval, the user got the below error message.

This error might be encountered for the item(s) whose workflow completed and initiated long back.

This is because of AutoCleanupDays property of Workflow. By default, the value is set to 60 days. After 60 days, if the workflow status is complete and initiated 60 days before, this workflow instance will be deleted. 

To delete all these old workflow instances, SharePoint runs a timer job named "Workflow Auto cleanup".

This deletion after 60 days is a default setting and is setup like that to avoid site performance issues. 

To retain these workflow instances

Browse to Central Administration -> Operations -> Timer Job definitions -> Disable Workflow Auto Cleanup task.

P.S.: Please note that this is not a Microsoft best practice to disable this timer job.

Documents are not visible with Read permissions on SharePoint Document Library

Issue Description

End user is not able to see a file in the document library. Users with Read Only permissions do not see the file. If permissions on this library is changed to anything else (Edit, Contribute, etc.) they can see the file. The permissions on the document are inherited from the library.

Resolution

In the Versioning Settings of the library, "Who should see draft items in this document library" was set to "Only users who can edit items”.

Change this to "Any user who can read items". 

SharePoint 2010 Search Query Suggestions

SharePoint Query suggestions (or Search suggestions), appear below the Search Box Web Part and on the search results page.

So how do we get these query suggestions? There are 2 ways to do this :

1) The first one is created automatically based on user searches.

Query suggestions depend on users' searches. Only search queries that have been previously returned and then clicked through at least six times will appear in either the search box list. Therefore, a newly deployed SharePoint Server 2010 system will not show query suggestions in either location. Moreover, a query suggestion will only appear in the search box list if the query suggestion contains at least one of the words that are typed.

2) The second once is created manually.

We can use Windows PowerShell to manually add query suggestions. The benefit of this method is query suggestions are available immediately to users of a newly installed search system. We can also supplement the default Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 behavior by adding query suggestions for key search terms.

In this manner, you can provide query suggestions that might not be generated by the system because users are not using the search terms that would create the query suggestions that you want to appear.

PowerShell to do this:

Here we are adding the following query suggestions manually (ford, test1, test2)

$searchapp = Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication -Identity "<SearchServiceApplicationName>"

New-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase -SearchApplication $searchapp -Language En-Us -Type QuerySuggestionAlwaysSuggest -Name "ford"

New-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase -SearchApplication $searchapp -Language En-Us -Type QuerySuggestionAlwaysSuggest -Name "test1"

New-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase -SearchApplication $searchapp -Language En-Us -Type QuerySuggestionAlwaysSuggest -Name "test2"

Start-SPTimerJob -Identity "prepare query suggestions"

There are options to turn off query suggestions so that they will not appear at query time. This is made possible by editing the Search Box Web Part.

How to move SharePoint list items from one list to another

If we have a list which is growing more than what was planned, it is always a good idea to split the list for performance improvement and for ease of use. There are multiple ways of doing this. Below is a simple way to do this.

For this exercise I have created 2 lists list1 and list2.My goal is to move all items from list2 to list1

1) Browse to Site Actions -> Manage Content and Structure

2) Alternatively, you can browse to Site Actions -> Site Settings -> Site Administration -> Content and structure

 

3) You are taken to the Site Content and Structure page.

4) Choose the items you want to move from list2 -> Actions -> Move

5) A pop up appears listing the destination. Choose list1

6) The move operation starts

7) list1 is populated with all items from list2.

ULS log Event ID 5240 “There was an error in communicating with Excel Calculation Services”

Issue Description

Recently I came across this issue where some of the end users were getting an error message when they tried to open an Excel file in SharePoint in the browser.

Unable to process the request.

Wait a few minutes and try performing this operation again.

- On checking the ULS logs I got the below error message.

ULS log Event ID 5240 “There was an error in communicating with Excel Calculation Services”

- On checking the Event Viewer on the server , there was the below error.

Event 2159, SharePoint Server

Event 5240 (Excel Services Application) of severity Error occurred 20 more time(s) and was suppressed in the event log

Cause

The Excel Services Application server computer is in a non-valid state and may need to be restarted.

Resolution

Most of the online articles were asking me to restart the Central Administration server.I did not want to do that and found a different fix.

Identify the application pool running the Excel Services service application (from IIS) and Recycle it.

1) Start –>Run –> inetmgr

2) Under the Sites click on SharePoint Web Services. This will list down the Services in SharePoint.

3) Click on each GUID –> Change the view from Features View to Content View

4) On finding ExcelService.asmx -> Right click that web service -> Manage Application -> Advanced Settings.

5) Identify the Application Pool (make a note of this).

6) Now in IIS –> Application Pools –> choose the Application Pool you noted down in previous step   -> Recycle (recycle the application pool).