Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 and Identity Lifecycle Management - identity

Customers are stored in Dynamics CRM 4.0 an some need access to external facing application and therefore should be provisioned in the DMZ Active Directory.
Does it make sense to use MS Identity Management Lifecycle to push the accounts in the DMZ Active Directory?

I would say that if you had bigger plans for maintaining the DMZ Active Directory with a number of sources of information, then I would go for MS ILM/FIM.
But, just to push users into AD from CRM by an event (e.g. flipping a RequiresADAccount bit on systemuser), I would go with some custom code to provision those users (System.DirectoryServices).

Related

SSRS passing Data Source credentials when deploying to SSRS Web Portal

I want certain reports to execute as a super user, but when I change the Credentials section for the .rdl embedded Data Sources, these changes do not propagate through to the web server. That is, users still have to enter their username/password on the web server, and run into permissions issues.
The current workaround is to "Manage" the report on the web server (using the ellipses...) and telling each report to log into the data source "Using the following credentials..." and putting the super user creds.
But this means that everytime we redeploy the report, we need to do this. We would prefer if the settings we have in the actual .rdl in SSRS actually show up on the web server after deployment.
I suggest to use shared datasources for your reports. For each database a report needs access to, create one such shared datasource. The default project settings for Report Server projects in Visual Studio is to not overwrite datasources that already exist on the server when deploying the project. This way, you will have to set the credentials in the Web Portal for each datasource only once, and you don't have to care about that when deploying updated reports.

Dynamics CRM 4 Async Service Jobs Waiting and HTTP Error 401.2

We're having an issue with Dynamics CRM 4.0.
Environment:
Dynamics CRM Enterprise 4.0 Update Rollup 20
Windows 2008 R2, SQL 2008 R2
Platform and Database servers on separate virtual machines
On-Premise deployment
We are using an imported organisation, the web site, outlook connectors and reports are all working without issue.
The issue we're having is that all workflows and system jobs are stuck in the Waiting status. Looking into the organisation database, we see a message like so:
Select Message from AsyncOperationBase where AsyncOperationId = 'SOMETHING';
We see a message that indicates the CrmService returned a 401 Unauthorized.
Using a browser, we can browse to:
http://crmserver/orgname/mscrmservices/2007/CrmService.asmx
and the service is correctly returned, however, when we browse to
http://crmserver/mscrmservices/2007/CrmService.asmx
we receive a 401.2 error.
Additionally, we can access the other services, such as the discovery service, via their normal path (without the org name). It's only the CrmService.asmx that displays the problem.
The CrmAsync and AppPool are all running under Network Service, and this issue is only affecting workflows.
We've tried Unpublishing/Republishing all workflows to no avail. We've run the IFD tool to ensure the server names are correctly set. We have uninstalled/re-installed.
Now we're stuck. Any ideas?
Turns out that the problem was related to hosting WSUS on the same web application as the Dynamics CRM service.
Fixed the problem by reinstalling Dynamics CRM to its own web application.

Unable to configure project reports in TFS 2010

I'm trying to use team foundation server power tools to add project reports to an existing team foundation server 2010 install. Here's the command I'm running with the output...
C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\VC>
tfpt addprojectreports /c ollection:https://SERVERNAME:8080/tfs/Projects /teamproject:SANDBOX / processtemplate:"MSF for CMMI Process Improvement v5.0" /validate
The project collection does not have reporting configured. Therefore,
reports cannot be added to projects in the collection.
The error message seems to indicate that reporting services has not been set up for the whole project collection. If I log into the TFS server and run the TFS admin console, hit Reporting under the application tier, each area (warehouse, analysis services and report server) indicate that everything is configured and enabled.
Also, if I point a browser to the report server configured within the admin console I get a directory listing with two data sources listed (Tfs2010OlapReportDS, Tfs2010ReportDS) and a directory called TfsReports. In the TfsReports dir there is a Projects directory and further a directory within the projects directory which contains what I'm assuming are the default reports for a project. If I drill all the way down to an actual report Build -> Build Summary, it runs just fine.
So, it seems like reports are configured for one of the team projects, but I'm not sure how this was accomplished since I'm not able to do this for other projects. If I run the previous command and use the name of the project that already has reports for it, I get the same error message.
I don't think I have the collection URL incorrect because if I totally fudge this I get a TF31002 error indicating unable to connect to TFS.
Any thoughts? Thanks a lot.
In the TFS Administration console, go to the project collection and in the Reports Folder tab ensure that you have set the Default Folder Location.
If the tab isn't showing (because you haven't closed the admin console since you configured reporting), click the refresh button at the top of the window and it should appear.

CRM_URL Report Parameter is incorrect

I am building custom reports in Microsoft CRM and am using the CRM_URL parameter to created drill downs.
However, the URL coming in is ***http://**myserver.com/org/CRMReports...* but it should be **https://**myserver.com/org/CRMReports...
My understanding is that this value is dynamically passed in by MS CRM. How/where can I update this URL to use https?
you need to use the SRSS config tool. =>
Configuring a Report Server for Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Connections (2005)
Configuring a Report Server for Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Connections (2008)
"Edit UrlRoot in the RSReportServer.config File
If you are using the report server e-mail delivery extension, you can create subscriptions that included a report URL in the e-mail message. To construct the report URL, the report server uses the UrlRoot configuration setting in the RSReportServer.config file. If the report runs on a report server that is accessed through an SSL connection, you must manually edit the UrlRoot to use the https:// prefix.
If you are using a server certificate, the format of the URL is as follows:
<UrlRoot>https://certificatename/reportservervirtualdirectoryname</UrlRoot>
The answer to my issue was #4 & #5 from this link:
http://rc.crm.dynamics.com/rc/regcont/en_us/op/articles/secure_comm.aspx#ID0EFD
For deployments that will not be used
by external clients, which connect
over the Internet, follow these steps:
Obtain a certificate from a CA. To use certificates you will have set
up a public key infrastructure (PKI),
which consists of one or more CAs that
are linked in a hierarchy. These CAs
and the PKI are required to manage
certificate issuance, validation,
renewal, and revocation in one or more
organizations. You can use a
third-party PKI with Microsoft Windows
Server 2003, or you can establish your
own PKI, based on Windows Server 2003
Certificate Services.
Make sure that there are no users accessing Internet Information
Services (IIS) where the Microsoft
Dynamics CRM Web application is
installed. To do this, stop the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site:
right-click the Web site, and then
click Stop.
Configure the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site to use SSL. To do this,
perform the following steps on the
server running IIS where the Microsoft
Dynamics CRM Web application is
installed:
1. Start Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager
2. Right-click the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site, and then click
Properties.
3. Click the Directory Security tab, click Server
Certificate, and then follow the
instructions in the Web Server
Certificate Wizard.
4. If you want clients to only use SSL when they connect to the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM application, on
the Directory Security tab in the
Secure communications area, click
Edit.
5. On the Secure Communications dialog box, click the
Require secure channel (SSL) check
box.
6. Close Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager.
Important: You can apply only a single certificate to the Microsoft
Dynamics CRM Web site. Therefore, you
if you have configured Microsoft
Dynamics CRM Server for both internal
and Internet-facing (external) access,
you cannot configure SSL for both
internal and external connections to
the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site.
You must manually modify the following values in the configuration
database.
Warning: Incorrectly modifying the configuration database
(MSCRM_CONFIG) can cause unexpected
behavior in the Microsoft Dynamics CRM
system or cause the system to stop
working. We recommend that you back up
the Microsoft Dynamics CRM system
before you complete these steps. For
information about how to back up the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM system, see the
Operating and Maintaining Guide that
is part of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM
4.0 Implementation Guide document set.
1. On the computer running Microsoft SQL Server, start SQL Server
Management Studio.
2. Expand Databases, expand MSCRM_CONFIG, expand Tables,
right-click dbo.DeploymentProperties,
and then click Open Table.
3. In the dbo.DeploymentProperties table under
the ColumnName column, in the
ADRootDomainScheme row, change the
NVarCharColumn column value from http
to https. Note that this value must be
in lower-case letters.
4. In the dbo.DeploymentProperties table, under
the ColumnName column, in the
ADSdkRootDomain row, change the
NVarCharColumn column value by using
the name of the certificate configured
for the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web
site. The name of the certificate can
be found, in Internet Information
Services (IIS) Manager, on the
Directory Security tab of the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site
properties page.
5. Click View Certificate.
6. On the Certificate dialog box, click Details.
7. Click the Friendly Name field to locate the certificate name.
If the certificate name is the same as
the computer name, you can use the
format ServerName:SSLPortNumber. By
default, the TCP port for SSL
connections is 443.
8. In the dbo.DeploymentProperties table, under
the ColumnName column, in the
ADWebApplicationRootDomain row, change
the NVarCharColumn column value by
using the name of the certificate
configured for the Microsoft Dynamics
CRM Web site. If the certificate name
is the same as the computer name, you
can use the format
ServerName:SSLPortNumber. By default,
the TCP port for SSL connections is
443.
9. Make sure your modifications are saved and then close
SQL Server Management Studio.
Modify the LocalSDKPort Windows registry subkey value. To do this,
complete the following steps.
Warning: Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry
incorrectly by using Registry Editor
or by using another method. These
problems might require that you
reinstall the operating system and
Microsoft Dynamics CRM. We cannot
guarantee that these problems can be
solved. Modify the registry at your
own risk.
1. Start Registry Editor, and locate the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSCRM
subkey.
2. Right-click LocalSdkPort, click Modify, and then click OK.
3. In the Base area, click Decimal, and then type the TCP port.
4. Click OK.
5. Close Registry Editor.
Restart IIS. To do this, at the command line, run the iisreset
command.
Start the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site. To do this, right-click the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site, and
then click Start.
Restart the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Asynchronous Processing Service.
To do this, click Start, point to
Administrative Tools, and then click
Services. In the list of services,
right-click Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Asynchronous Processing Service, and
then click Restart.
Verify that you can successfully connect to the Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Web site. To do this, you must use a
URL that begins with https. For
example, in Internet Explorer the URL
will appear similar to the following
address:
https://ServerName/OrganizationName/loader.aspx
If the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Web site is not configured to require
SSL connections, verify that you can
successfully connect to the site by
using an http connection, for example,
http://ServerName/OrganizationName/loader.aspx.

Moving ssrs ad hoc reports

We have a reporting server which has a bunch of reports and some ad hoc user reports created by users using report builder. Now we need to move all these to a different server. The new server already has some reports in it. I need to move all the reports from the older server to a folder in the new server because of this moving the database from the old server to the new server is not an option. I want to know if we have some other way to export all the reports from the older server and then deploy it to the new server.
You can use the ReportingService web service to programmatically interact with SSRS. I used it once to create a basic bulk report uploader.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/reportservice2005.reportingservice2005.aspx
Alternatively, some googling turned up this application, although I've never used it.
http://www.sqldbatips.com/showarticle.asp?ID=62