Windows Server 2012 Essentials, An Error prevented the Dashboard from opening
April 29, 2013 37 Comments
This is an issue that has caught me out once or twice in my testing and general messing about with Essentials over the last age, and also someone in the forum just posted a question along these lines so i thought it worth a post. I have been struggling with a bit of ‘writers block’* recently and this seemed to be something easy to get back into blogging again with.
* I do not consider myself to be a writer, merely a lazy admin who had nothing interesting to say.
Anyway…
You have somehow deleted a certificate, and then the Dashboard fails to open. That could be through IIS from the server certificates area, or just through the Local Computer, Personal Certificate store.. but when attempting to open the Dashboard you see:
Dashboard Error
An error prevented the Dashboard from opening..
If you go to that link you get a TechNet wiki article about SBS 2011 Essentials, and it doesn’t answer this particular issue other than to give some guidance on general issues with certificates.
Thankfully the fix for this is simple.
Go to c:\Program Files\Windows Server\Bin and run the WSSPowerShell.exe file.
Then type in: Add-WssLocalMachineCert
This will reissue a Certificate to the local computer and also repair the registry settings tied to that certificate.
if you are interested to know, you can see a lot of settings related to Essentials in the registry here:
HKLM>Software>Microsoft>WindowsServer
The entries relating to the dashboard error above, can be found under IDENTITY.
In this case the LocalMachineCert value is that of the thumbprint of the certificate the Dashboard expects to be part of the local machine store in order for it to start.
If that cert is missing or damaged the Dashboard will fail.
Running the above PowerShell cmdlet will request a new certificate and update this registry key with the new thumbprint ID.
You can see the thumbprint value here is updated.
When attempting to open the Dashboard for the first time after this, you may see a warning about Addins that may have caused the problem. You can click on Continue here to get to the Dashboard.
About Robert Pearman
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Great…..
Pure AWESOME post. Life-saver, when everyone else says, “Re-install!” Worked perfect on WHS 2011….
I changed mine to a workgroup and now i can open it! Can someone please help. The above didn’t work
Can someone please help. I changed mine to a work-group and now i cant open the dashboard. The above solution didn’t solve it but my problem is the exact same. Because im on a workgroup when i run that command it says it cannot find the domain. Please help
Yeah, you should not have done that!
I guess you also removed the Certificate Services?
im getting this error when i execute the command Add-WssLocalMachineCert
Add-WssLocalMachineCert : Submit error
At line:1 char:24
+ Add-WssLocalMachineCert <<<<
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [Add-WssLocalMachineCert], Cer
tificatesException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Certificates.Ce
rtificatesException,Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Administration.AddLoc
alMachineCert
This was amazing! Thank you so much for taking the time and posting this! I just wish that Google had indexed it higher. It took me forever to find this article, but once I did it totally saved my bacon!
PS C:\Program Files\Windows Server\Bin> Add-WssLocalMachineCert
Add-WssLocalMachineCert : Submit error
At line:1 char:1
+ Add-WssLocalMachineCert
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [Add-WssLocalMachineCert], Cer
tificatesException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Certificates.Ce
rtificatesException,Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Administration.AddLoc
alMachineCert
So no news on this ?
Do you have any more info on your setup?
its Win Sbs 2011, act as DNS DHCP, DC
Can you run the Essentials Tester on there and see if identifies any issues?
http://titlerequired.com/2014/02/14/windows-server-essentialsconfiguration-troubleshooter/
Version Info: Version: 1.91
1. Test IIS
2. Test CA Infrastructure
3. Test Services
4. Test Service Ports
0. Quit
Enter Task..
2
Testing CA Name..
Certificate Authority Online : OK
Certificate Authority Name : OK
Certificate Authority Cert : OK
Testing /Connect Certificate Package..
Connect Computer Certificate : Errors Detected – ProgramData
Testing CRL Download..
CRL Location : http://MOONSHINE/CertEnroll/SPR-MOONSHINE-CA.crl
CRL Destination : c:\windows\temp\crl.crl
CRL Download : OK
Unable to fully Test Certificate Authority on this Operating System.
Testing Dashboard Certificate..
Review your results, items in red should be investigated.
Is that the full result?
I think so, there you go a screen shot https://www.dropbox.com/s/hrhs9otrxkljatu/screen.png?dl=0
Can you check in the registry at this path,
HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows Server\Identity – do you have a value there?
This is what i got for HKey_Local_Machine:\Software\Microsoft\Windows Server\Identity
OK if you go into an MMC, add the certificates snapin for the local machine.
In the personal store there should be a certificate for the Server, it will be just shown with the server hostname.
It should have the same thumbprint as in that registry entry above for ‘LocalMachineCert’
for some reason i dont see it there
Can you find c:\Program Files\Windows Server\Bin
Look for the WssPowerShell.exe file and run it.
and after i run WssPowerShell.exr should i run the command from the tutorial Add-WssLocalMachineCert ?
and if yes, this is the outcome
Add-WssLocalMachineCert : Submit error
At line:1 char:1
+ Add-WssLocalMachineCert
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [Add-WssLocalMachineCert], Cer
tificatesException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Certificates.Ce
rtificatesException,Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Administration.AddLoc
alMachineCert
PS C:\Program Files\Windows Server\Bin>
Do you have any errors or warnings in the event logs that correspond to the same time?
Any issues with the services test (3) on the essentials tester?
most of the services are down, because i cannot start WSS Service Provider Registry i get Error 1067 when i try it and for the rest i get 1068 which is dependencies error.
And underneath you can see the message in the events log
Interesting.
OK,
can you post an ipconfig /all from the server?
sure
you shouldn’t have 8.8.8.8 as a dns server.
can you take that out, then run a dcdiag /test:dns
sure, i removed it and this is the outcome
ok can you post the error in the event logs from when you try to start the WSS Service Provider Registry.
Im not sure if im looking at the right place but in the event viewer->custom views-> server roles -> AD Certificate services -> is this warning
Active Directory Certificate Services denied request 9536 because Element not found. 0x80070490 (WIN32: 1168). The request was for CN=MOONSHINE. Additional information: Denied by Policy Module 0x80070490, Active Directory Certificate Services could not find required Active Directory information.
Resubmitted by SPR\bootlegger
try the system log.
There isnt errors or warnings in the system log with source AD Certificate Services.
We are not looking for that source.
You need to find out why the WSS Provider Registry service wont start, just look for _any_ warnings or errors.
when i restart the service i get this The Windows Server Service Provider Registry service terminated unexpectedly. It has done this 1 time(s). The following corrective action will be taken in 60000 milliseconds: Restart the service.
There are three different warnings and one error
warning 1 with source group policy
The Group Policy Client Side Extension Software Installation was unable to apply one or more settings because the changes must be processed before system startup or user logon. The system will wait for Group Policy processing to finish completely before the next startup or logon for this user, and this may result in slow startup and boot performance.
warning 2 App Management GP
Failed to apply changes to software installation settings. The installation of software deployed through Group Policy for this user has been delayed until the next logon because the changes must be applied before the user logon. The error was : %%1274
warning 3 sorurce App Mngmt GP
The assignment of application Symantec.cloud – Group Policy Deployment from policy print failed. The error was : %%1274
and the error source App Mngmt GP
The removal of the assignment of application Symantec.cloud – Group Policy Deployment from policy print failed. The error was : %%2
i dont see any other warning or errors that might have impact on that throughout the whole day
You need to check the logs in c:\programData\Microsoft\Windows Server\Logs – the sharedService logs are probably a good place to start, but anything time stamed near a service start attempt will work.
However I suspect the issue is relating to your missing cert – so you are trapped in a bit of a loop.
Hi Robert, I have the same problem, but I’m running Windows Server 2016 Essentials. There is no program called wsspowershell.exe, but I tried add-WssLocalMachineCert in both Windows Powershell and Windows Powershell ISE as an admin. it gives this error:
—————————————————————————
add-wsslocalmachinecert : The user name or password is incorrect.
At line:1 char:1
+ add-wsslocalmachinecert
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [Add-WssLocalMachineCert], DirectoryServicesCOMException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : System.DirectoryServices.DirectoryServicesCOMException,Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.
Administration.AddLocalMachineCert
————————————————————————————-
Any ideas?
On 2016 you don’t need to import the module, so the exe is not required. Can you send a screen shot of what you have done?
I think I fixed the problem by following your steps here:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/exchange/en-US/11e90399-7192-4e6b-b973-ebbc2810b379/there-is-an-error-with-your-web-service-settings-that-cannot-be-repaired-automatically-please?forum=winserveressentials
I made sure that the registry key matched the local machine cert.
Thanks for your help!