SharePoint SSO error and Window Server 2003 SP1

"Failed to connect to the database server. Verify connectivity and rights for the configuration account and try again."

On a project I was recently working on we ran into this error message when configuring SSO in SPS.

Well ... after much hair pulling ... we found that we were not alone. There are a couple of posts from people on the net about workarounds that may or may not work (they didnt for us). I also found another MS consultant working with another customer who was having the same problem.

It is funny how problems look like one thing on the surface ... but are totally related to something else under the hood. As it turns out ... this problem is due to Windows Installer 3.1 that happens to be installed when you apply Windows Server 2003 SP1 !

The problem is fairly easily resolved however ... by manually tweeking a registry entry.

Find the ImagePath registry entry at the following location:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\ssosrv

Remove the quotation strings from around the the ImagePath value ... and away you go.

The result of all this is that there is currently a KB being written that will outline the problem and the steps to fix it.

Comments

• Anonymous
  July 11, 2005
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 15, 2005
  Thanks for this, you saved me big yesterday.

• Anonymous
  July 17, 2005
  i did remove the quotation string at the imagepath in the registry..but the error still same as before which "failed to connect to database.."
  
  pls help me..i spent a lot of time to solve this..

• Anonymous
  July 26, 2005
  Thank you very much for this information!

• Anonymous
  July 27, 2005
  We experienced the same error but found a different root cause.
  
  We found that some of the various tables in the SP DB had <null> as the owner. We ran a SQL script to determine which tables had this issue and then changing the ownership to a service account.
  
  NOTE: We do not have Win2003 SP1 installed, although we do have Windows Installer 3.1 installed. I did not find any quotes around the regestry values.

• Anonymous
  August 01, 2005
  I had this problem, i've Windows 2003 SP1, and SPS 2003 SP1 chang privileges to tempdb on SQL Server for my service account to db_owner and change de database name from SSO to SSO_DB and works

• Anonymous
  August 03, 2005
  I'm also having the same problem but removing the quotation strings alone from the registry didn't work for me.
  
  I also had to stop & start the service of Micrsoft Single Sign on before it worked.
  
  Thanks for the registry information!

• Anonymous
  August 09, 2005
  Yes you do have to restart the Microsoft Single Sign-on Service before this works. Here is the KB Article: KB901203

• Anonymous
  September 10, 2005
  I restart the Microsoft Single Sign-On Service after updating the registry file, but still problem does not resolved.
  Any body who face the same problem, please reply.
  Adnan

• Anonymous
  November 14, 2005
  if there is a heaven my friend.. you are there!
  you saved me BIG. Thanks

• Anonymous
  November 21, 2005
  Yep. That did it! Be sure to bounce the SSO service before trying again!

• Anonymous
  December 01, 2005
  Thanks a ton Dude this worked fine! You sure are going to get a nod at the Pearly Gates!

• Anonymous
  December 06, 2005
  Similar story. Up down back forth no joy till the quotes were removed and restarted SSO service.
  Many Thanks!

• Anonymous
  December 21, 2005
  This worked great! you are so cool!

• Anonymous
  December 29, 2005
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  February 20, 2006
  Thanks very much!
  
  I was fiddeling with this problem for quite some time!
  
  Works fine now!

• Anonymous
  February 26, 2006
  Hi,
  I have MS SharePoint Portal Server 2003 installed with SP2 and WSS with Sp2 as well. I am using SQL Server 2005 to connect to DB. I have removed quotation marks from the registry as well. But still getting the following error: "You do not have the rights to perform this operation."

• Anonymous
  March 01, 2006
  This worked like a charm! Removed the quotes and rebooted and works flawlessly now.
  
  Syed -- for reference, I have the same setup as you including SQL 2005 and my setup works. Hope this helps!

• Anonymous
  March 02, 2006
  thanks, I wasted several hours thinking I was a complete idiot until I looked up the problem on the internet.
  
  Thanks.  I can go home and not beat my kids tonight.

• Anonymous
  March 09, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  March 15, 2006
  Woooooooooo!
  3+ hours of hurt before i found this blog.
  SQL 2005 + SPPS sp2 + W2003 SP1 = pain.
  
  THANK YOU.
  

• Anonymous
  March 21, 2006
  No problem ... it frustrated me for a long time before i figured it out.  Glad it has helped.

• Anonymous
  March 30, 2006
  I had the same Problem , i fix the Regkey then i become 0x80040E14 Error
  
  I logon on the Server and login with the Service Account from "SSO Service" start the SSO Config Page, at me it works now.
  
  Hope i can help someone

• Anonymous
  April 05, 2006
  Thank you very much for your article..
  it helped us a lot

• Anonymous
  April 19, 2006
  Read the article, thought it was a good shot after granting full access on all SQL db's etc. Then I used this article to remove the registry quotations from the imagepath but still nothing.. Only Musch later realised that you have to stop and start the Microsft Single-Sign-On service.
  
  Thanks all, this helped a stack!!

• Anonymous
  June 26, 2006
  hello Chris,
  
  i'm having issues with this sso thing too, wondering if you can help. i have everything configured and i can add accounts to my db and if i go run the stored procedure to get all credentials it also returns me a row confirming that the application and credentials are there but i keep getting an error for the Credentials.getCredentials method call. i'm able to successfully call the setCredentials and setUserCredential methods, based on code samples on microsoft site but getCredentials seems to be failing. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
  
  thanks,
  ambreen
  
  here's what it shows in event log
  
  Event Type: Error
  Event Source: Office SharePoint Server
  Event Category: SSO
  Event ID:                6492
  Date: 6/26/2006
  Time: 10:48:09 AM
  User: N/A
  Computer:                mycomp
  Description:
  The Microsoft Single Sign-on (SSOSrv) service failed to retrieve credentials for user mydomainmyuser, enterprise application definition Northwind. The error returned was 0x80040e14. For more information, see the Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies Software Development Kit (SDK).
  
  For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
  

• Anonymous
  June 29, 2006
  After hours of pulling my hair thinking that I was doing something wrong!!! It blows my mind how the error message would suggest something so wrong. But thanks much, you saved the day!

• Anonymous
  July 10, 2006
  PingBack from http://weblogs.com.pk/aziz/archive/2006/07/11/4492.aspx

• Anonymous
  July 10, 2006
  I've tryed everything, but nothing worked untill I found a bug in "c:Program FilesCommon FilesMicrosoft SharedMicrosoft Single Sign-onsso_schema.sql". It seems to be because of that my SQLServer's default code page was case sensitive and a variable in this script did not met case in the declaration.
  Procedure:dbo.sso_InsertUpdateApplication, variable @Numfields (@numfields and @NumFields).
  Try to run SQL Query Analyzer, open this script and press Ctrl+F5 (Parse Query). After correcting case of those strings - try to run SSO configuration again.
  If you want to ask about it - write to "anpal at bigmir dot net".
  
  Good luck!

• Anonymous
  July 10, 2006
  I've tried everything, but nothing worked untill I found a bug in "c:Program FilesCommon FilesMicrosoft SharedMicrosoft Single Sign-onsso_schema.sql". It seems to be because of that my SQLServer's default code page was case sensitive and a variable in this script did not met case in the declaration.
  Procedure:dbo.sso_InsertUpdateApplication, variable @Numfields (@numfields and @NumFields).
  Try to run SQL Query Analyzer, open this script and press Ctrl+F5 (Parse Query). After correcting case of those strings - try to run SSO configuration again.
  If you want to ask about it - write to "anpal at bigmir dot net".
  
  Good luck!

• Anonymous
  August 13, 2006
  I was also receiving all of the various errors reported above and ended with the 0x80040E14 Error.
  
  I was already logged onto the Server as the SSO Admin Account so this didnt resolve my problem.
  
  In my case I needed to delete the SSO database that had been created along the way. Once this was done it recreated it and started working like a charm.
  
  Denis @ obs

• Anonymous
  November 06, 2006
  Hi, I have MS SharePoint Portal Server 2003 installed with SP2 and WSS with Sp2 as well. I am using SQL Server 2005 to connect to DB. I have removed quotation marks from the registry as well. But still getting the following error: "You do not have the rights to perform this operation."

• Anonymous
  November 10, 2006
  Just to add my 2pence to the discussion... I tried all the suggestions above to no avail.  I finally came across the fact that the SSO Service was running as the local system account. I changed this to a domain account and it works perfectly. Mark

• Anonymous
  December 19, 2006
  I ran into this problem.  Turns out I had a sql database without an owner -- that database was not even a sharepoint database, but it affected creating the SSO DB!! Grr... check to see if you have any databases without an owner use master select * from sysdatabases where suser_sname(sid) is NULL user <name of database that does not have sp_changedbowner 'sa'

• Anonymous
  December 19, 2006
  I ran into this problem.  Turns out I had a sql database without an owner -- that database was not even a sharepoint database, but it affected creating the SSO DB!! Grr... check to see if you have any databases without an owner use master select * from sysdatabases where suser_sname(sid) is NULL use <insert database without owner> sp_changedbowner 'sa'

• Anonymous
  April 16, 2007
  Mark Stokes thanx a lot! Removing quotes didn't help for me as well, but your suggestion regarding changing local account to domain one for SSO Service did the trick. :) Regards,

• Anonymous
  April 30, 2007
  It was the missing DB owner for me.  I am using a shared SB server for SPS03 and I had one application's DB with no owner. use <insert database without owner> EXEC sp_changedbowner 'sa' Is what i used... Brutal, absolutely brutal.

• Anonymous
  May 03, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  May 22, 2007
  Hi! Similar problem like Ambreen: Event Type: Error Event Source: Office SharePoint Server Event Category: SSO Event ID:                6492 Date: 6/26/2006 Time: 10:48:09 AM User: N/A Computer:                mycomp Description: The Microsoft Single Sign-on (SSOSrv) service failed to retrieve credentials for user mydomainmyuser, enterprise application definition Northwind. The error returned was 0x80040e14. For more information, see the Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies Software Development Kit (SDK). Running 2003 SP1 Tried all hints and tips - nothing worked. The configuration of the SSO is devided into several steps. I couldn´t find a description with the complete process - what to do first, 2nd step and so on. What I see is that there are several debendencies within accounts, ad, domain and so on. Is there a complete description / process sheet available? The bad thing is - I must work on a german installation what gives me lots of trouble with the "great" translation. Cheers PKONSITE

• Anonymous
  November 03, 2007
  Well done guys! I have no experience in SQL or programming but after removing speach marks, resetting MSSO snapin AND resetting MOSS/SSO bumf all works well! However still dont understand why SP-Designer is throwing up same error when not using SSO ie domain/administrator....?

• Anonymous
  November 05, 2007
  Excellent articles on resolving SSO Issues with MOSS 2007. http://chriscalderon.blogspot.com/2007/05/resolving-microsoft-single-sign-on.html http://cakriwut.wordpress.com/2007/08/19/moss-2007-fixing-ssosrv-error-0x80040e14/

• Anonymous
  December 26, 2007
  Try logging on to the server with the account you want to use (but first make sure this account is an OSS admin).  Make sure the account has all requirements for SSO and then complete the page.  This solved the issue for me.

• Anonymous
  April 08, 2008
  I needed SSO to get SAP iView to work on MOSS 2007. I tried all the above steps without luck. Finally i installes the SPS SP1 and MOSS SP1, rebooted the share point 2007 frontend servers, generated new SSO keys, with check for update existing passwords, - that made the trick. Tnx. a lot for the help.

• Anonymous
  April 30, 2008
  PingBack from http://famousfunnymoviequoteblog.info/chris-johnson-sharepoint-sso-error-and-window-server-2003-sp1/

• Anonymous
  July 23, 2009
  i have got the following error  ( the instruction at 0x77f81764 reference memory at 0x 00000000 the memory could not be read) how to solve  this  my email adress is geophrey2001@hotmail.com

• Anonymous
  September 11, 2009
  I was getting the error "You do not have the rights to perform this operation" when I tried to configure the SSO settings.  My SSO service was running as Local System, but I changed it to a domain account and the error went away.