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Problem

If you are seeing 401.1 unauthorized event log entries by the SharePoint Gatherer in your event log, this article may be what you've been googling for.

Are you able to browse to your sharepoint site from the server logged in as the search crawling account?  No luck?  Keep reading.

Reason

With the Windows Server 2003 SP1 ( or possibly just the .Net Framework 3.5 SP1), Microsoft introduced a new security feature that checks for loopbacks (making calls to web applications locally from thet server).  If your search service is running on the same server that is hosting your web applications (which is best practice for indexing speed), you'll most likely recieve this unauthorized error.  You may also see this error for any custom applications which use the SharePiont web services locally. This security fix is meant to block malicious applications from infultrating your web sites from within, which is a good fix in my opinion.

How to I get around this 401 unauthorized then?

Microsoft recommends two fixes.  Both of them are registry modifications.

One turns off the Loopback check altogether which shouldn't be done on external facing production servers for obvious reasons.  The other is to specify the sites that allow loopback from the server.

Here's the instructions for the registry modifications required for both methods:

MS KB Article 896861

Tags: sharepoint, wss 3.0, sharepoint search, disableloopbackcheck

Microsoft SharePoint (WSS 3.0) search is probably one of the most common points of failure and source of support tickets for our customers.

Here are some of the major points to check when troubleshooting this service.

1. Make sure the content database is assigned an indexer.

      Open SharePoint Central Administration > Application Management > Content Databases

      Select your web application if it is not already selected.

      Click on the content database. 

      Make sure that the Search Server dropdown has the servername selected which is running the WSS Search Service.

2. Make sure you have implemented the DisableLoopbackCheck registry entry.

     Check out this blog post.

3. Make sure your search service is running as a domain account and that the account credentials were entered correctly (with DOMAIN\serviceaccount) in Central Administration.

4. Make sure your alternate access mappings in the default zone are accessible from the server.

5. If using forms authentication, use windows authentication in the default zone, and then extend the web application to the internet zone which uses forms. 

6. If pdf files are not being indexed correctly on 64bit systems, there may be a registry entry that you are missing.

    Note there is an extra registry GUID change for the 64bit Adobe I filter.  Here'a a link to a well written post : Here

7. After all these are verified and\or changed to the correct configurations, run an stsadm full crawl.

    This is performed by opening a command promt  on the server running the Windows SharePoint Services Search Service then:

    Type cd C:\program files\common files\microsoft shared\web server extensions\12\bin

    Hit Enter

    Type stsadm -o spsearch -action fullcrawlstart

    Hit Enter

    Your content should begin the indexing process

    Check the event lot to see if the 401 unauthorized messages have gone away.

I hope this helps you guys out there in the field.

Tags: sharepoint, wss 3.0, sharepoint search