I started up the DEV server too start my CRM dev this morning only to be confronted with a big fat error
The same error happened on every page, so it’s a fundamental error.
Yesterday IT sent an email warning me they would be gently powering down the servers for some maintenance (I bet they really just turned them off).
These common errors are another bonus of companies moving to the cloud because these problems won’t occur or will be fixed by Microsoft.
Check the time on the server
Checking the time on the server seems an odd thing to do, but if the time on the server is greater than 5 minutes out from your PC then CRM will fail to authenticate the user. This is a common problem which pops up and to resolve this you need to get the IT team (or you if you don’t have one) to make sure you setting the time on the server properly (e.g. the same as the PC’s) so it stops the servers time drifting.
Check the CRM Asynchronous services
This should be your first thing to check because if the ASYNC services have stopped then CRM will stop working. If you want to learn more about CRM Asyncs, you can go here
Asynchronous service in Microsoft Dynamics CRM
To see if the Async services are running, Microsoft have a document for starting and stopping
- Navigate to Start, select Administrative Tools, then click Services.
You should find there are four CRM Async services and you can see if they are started
The Async processing service is usually the cause of CRM not working.
The problem displayed on this page was caused
If you have restarted the Asyncs and CRM is still not working
Check IIS is up and running
go to the Start menu
type IIS
It will bring up Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager
IIS is the webserver which hosts the Microsoft Dynamics CRM website. Some times you can find this may be stopped (very very rarely but its something to check, so we can rule it out)
There are a couple of things to check
CRM Application pools are running
CRM web app will have an application pool to run the web app, you need to double check its started and running. The app pool will usually be set to a service account, the main reason you use a service account is because you don’t need to reset the password every 60 days. Sometimes this setting won’t have been set and the app pool password will change and until someone goes in and puts/resets the password the CRM App pool will stop working. When the CRM app pool stops working, CRM stops working.
Its worth noting if any of the other app pools are not started because they may be stopped on purpose or maybe have been stopped accidently.
you cann see the CRMAppPool below
Is the CRM Website up
if you click on the CRM website called Microsoft Dynamics CRM then the details of the web app will appear on the right, you need to check the start is greyed out (which means it is selected)
World Wide Web Publishing Service
There is also a service which controls if IIS is up and running and this is called the World Wide Web Publishing Service (named in the 1990’s I should imagine, not many times you see the words of WWW). This can be turned off to stop IIS springing back to life after the server has been rebooted.
SQL Server
I often think of CRM as a web application to show the contents of the CRM SQL database. If the SQL CRM instance is down, SQL server is off or can’t be contacted then CRM will stop working.
If CRM isn’t working you need to check the SQL server (usually on a different server) is up and running and the CRM instances are running.
Windows Event Viewer
They are some common things to check if CRM isn’t working but you will also need to check for some pointers for other errors. The place I usually start is by checking the Event Viewer log on the CRM server.
Go to the CRM Server
Start Menu – type in Event Viewer
or
Control Panel –> Administrative Tools –> Event Viewer
Windows Logs –> Application
Look at the errors and warnings to see if there is anything which might point you in the direction of the potential error. It’s unlikely you will actually get an error, usually I find it’s a warning and the warning will point you in the direction of the cause of CRM not working.
here is the logs from the server for the error shown at the top of the blog
You can see there are a view warnings, a .NET, a sandbox. Be warned there is often a lot of noise in the event logs (e.g. warning and errors which are not important).
I lookeda the .NET error
Process information:
Process ID: 5348
Process name: w3wp.exe
Account name: DEV\CRMAPPPOOL
Exception information:
Exception type: CrmException
Exception message: The plug-in execution failed because no Sandbox Hosts are currently available. Please check that you have a Sandbox server configured and that it is running.
System.ServiceModel.EndpointNotFoundException: Microsoft Dynamics CRM has experienced an error. Reference number for administrators or support: #72E41A64
at Microsoft.Crm.Application.Platform.ServiceCommands.PlatformCommand.XrmExecuteInternal()
at Microsoft.Crm.Application.Platform.ServiceCommands.RetrieveMultipleCommand.Execute()
at Microsoft.Crm.Caching.DefaultSavedQueryIdCacheLoader.LoadCacheData(SavedQueryIdCacheKey key, IOrganizationContext context)
at Microsoft.Crm.Caching.CrmSharedMultiOrgCache`2.LookupEntry(TKey key, IOrganizationContext context)
at Microsoft.Crm.Caching.DefaultSavedQueryIdsCache.TryLookupEntry(Int32 objectType, Int32 savedQueryType)
at Microsoft.Crm.Application.Components.Sdk.FormControls.Web.LookupControl.ConfigureControl()
at Microsoft.Crm.Application.Components.UI.CrmUIControlBase.ConfigureControlInternal()
It pointed to the Sandbox service and when I checked the CRM services, I saw the sandbox service was stopped. I started the sandbox service and CRM popped back into life.
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