
Category Archives: Health


Delete cbs.log file its growing large

search diagnostics and reports sharepoint
We can access and analyze several query and crawl health reports, logs and usage reports from the Search service application in the SharePoint Central Administration to monitor the health of the search system.
The health reports and logs only contain information after a full crawl has completed. To run a full crawl, we have to set up a Search service application, add at least one content source, and then start a full crawl.
To view the health reports and the crawl log, one have to be an administrator of the Search service application. Alternatively, an administrator who is a member of the Farm Administrators group can grant user accounts Read permissions on the Search service application. A user account that has Read permissions can only view the Search service application status page, the health reports and the crawl log.
Query health reports:
- Trend
- Overall
- Main Flow
- Federation
- SharePoint Search Provider
- People Search Provider
- Index Engine
To view query health reports:
- Verify that the user account that is performing this procedure is an administrator of or has Read permissions to the Search service application.
- In Central Administration, under Application Management, click Manage service applications.
- On the Service Applications page, click the Search service application.
- On the Search Administration page, in the Quick Launch, in the Diagnostics section, click Query Health Reports.
- On the Search Service Application: Query Latency Trend page, click the query report that you want to view.
The following table shows which reports are available.
Crawl health reports:
SharePoint 2013 provides the following reports about crawl health:
- Crawl Rate
- Crawl Latency
- Crawl Queue
- Crawl Freshness
- Content Processing Activity
- CPU and Memory Load
- Continuous Crawl
To view crawl health reports
- Verify that the user account that is performing this procedure is an administrator of or has Read permissions to the Search service application.
- In Central Administration, under Application Management, click Manage service applications.
- On the Service Applications page, click the Search service application.
- On the Search Administration page, in the Quick Launch, in the Diagnostics section, click Crawl Health Reports.
- On the Search Service Application: Crawl Reports page, click the crawl health report that you want to view.
The following table shows which reports are available.
Crawl log:
The crawl log tracks information about the status of crawled content. This log lets you determine whether crawled content was successfully added to the index, whether it was excluded because of a crawl rule, or whether indexing failed because of an error. The crawl log also contains information such as the time of the last successful crawl and whether any crawl rules were applied. You can use the crawl log to diagnose problems with the search experience.
To view the crawl log
- Verify that the user account that is performing this procedure is an administrator of the Search service application, or has Read permissions to it.
- In Central Administration, under Application Management, click Manage service applications.
- On the Service Applications page, click the Search service application.
- On the Search Administration page, in the Quick Launch, in the Diagnostics section, click Crawl Log.
- On the Crawl Log – Content Source page, click the view that you want.
Additional columns in the Content Source, Host Name and Crawl History views:
Usage reports (search report):
To view usage reports
- Verify that the user account that is performing this procedure is an administrator of or has Read permissions to the Search service application.
- In Central Administration, under Application Management, click Manage service applications.
- On the Service Applications page, click the Search service application.
- On the Search Administration page, in the Quick Launch, in the Diagnostics section, click Usage Reports.
- On the View Usage Reports page, click the usage or search reports view that you want view.

Configure diagnostic logging SharePoint 2016

Monitor cache performance SharePoint 2016
SharePoint Server 2016 provides three types of caches that help improve the speed at which web pages load in the browser: the BLOB cache, the ASP.NET output cache, and the object cache.
The BLOB cache is a disk-based cache that stores binary large object files that are used by web pages to help the pages load quickly in the browser.
The ASP.NET output cache stores the rendered output of a page. It also stores different versions of the cached page, based on the permissions of the users who are requesting the page.
The object cache reduces the traffic between the web server and the SQL database by storing objects such as lists and libraries, site settings, and page layouts in memory on the front-end web server. As a result, the pages that require these items can be rendered quickly, increasing the speed with which pages are delivered to the client browser.
The monitors measure cache hits, cache misses, cache compactions, and cache flushes. The following list describes each of these performance monitors.
A cache hit occurs when the cache receives a request for an object whose data is already stored in the cache. A high number of cache hits indicates good performance and a good end-user experience.
A cache miss occurs when the cache receives a request for an object whose data is not already stored in the cache. A high number of cache misses might indicate poor performance and a slower end-user experience.
Cache compaction (also known as trimming), happens when a cache becomes full and additional requests for non-cached content are received. During compaction, the system identifies a subset of the contents in the cache to remove, and removes them. Typically these contents are not requested as frequently.
Compaction can consume a significant portion of the server’s resources. This can affect both server performance and the end-user experience. Therefore, compaction should be avoided. You can decrease the occurrence of compaction by increasing the size of the cache. Compaction usually happens if the cache size is decreased. Compaction of the object cache does not consume as many resources as the compaction of the BLOB cache.
A cache flush is when the cache is completely emptied. After the cache is flushed, the cache hit to cache miss ratio will be almost zero. Then, as users request content and the cache is filled up, that ratio increases and eventually reaches an optimal level. A consistently high number for this counter might indicate a problem with the farm, such as constantly changing library metadata schemas.
You can monitor the effectiveness of the cache settings to make sure that the end-users are getting the best experience possible. Optimum performance occurs when the ratio of cache hits to cache misses is high and when compactions and flushes only rarely occur. If the monitors do not indicate these conditions, you can improve performance by changing the cache settings.
The following sections provide specific information for monitoring each kind of cache.
Monitoring BLOB cache performance:
Note:
For the BLOB cache, a request is only counted as a cache miss if the user requests a file whose extension is configured to be cached. For example, if the cache is enabled to cache .jpg files only, and the cache gets a request for a .gif file, that request is not counted as a cache miss.
Monitoring ASP.NET output cache performance :
Note:
For the ASP.NET output cache, all pages are cached for a fixed duration that is independent of user actions. Therefore, there are flush-related monitoring events.
Monitoring object cache performance :
The object cache is used to store metadata about sites, libraries, lists, list items, and documents that are used by features such as site navigation and the Content Query Web Part.
This cache helps users when they browse to pages that use these features because the data that they require is stored or retrieved directly from the object cache instead of from the content database.
The object cache is stored in the RAM of each web server in the farm. Each web server maintains its own object cache.
You can monitor the effectiveness of the cache settings by using the performance monitors that are listed in the following table.

Content databases contain orphaned Apps SharePoint 2013
Content databases contain orphaned Apps
SharePoint Health Analyzer rule “Content databases contain orphaned Apps.”
Some situation content database may become corrupted. The corrupted database may contain orphaned apps. Orphaned apps are not accessible, which causes unnecessary resource and license consumption and may result in failures in SharePoint upgrade.
Solution
Remove app for SharePoint instances from a SharePoint 2013 site.
A user must have the Manage Web site permission to remove an app for SharePoint. By default, this permission is only available to users with the Full Control permission level or who are in the site Owners group.
To remove an app from a SharePoint site
- Verify that the user account that is performing this procedure is a member of the Site owners group.
- On the site, on the Settings menu, click View Site Contents.
- In the Apps section, point to the app that you want to remove, click “…”, and then click Remove.
- Click OK to confirm that you want to remove the app.
To remove an app by using Windows PowerShell
Verify that you have the following memberships:
- securityadmin fixed server role on the SQL Server instance.
- db_owner fixed database role on all databases that are to be updated.
- Administrators group on the server on which you are running the Windows PowerShell cmdlets.
- Site Owners group on the site collection to which you want to install the app.
An administrator can use the Add-SPShellAdmin cmdlet to grant permissions to use SharePoint 15 Products cmdlets. On the Start screen, click SharePoint 2013 Management Shell, type the following commands, and press ENTER after each one:
$instances = Get-SPAppInstance -Web
#Gets all apps installed to the subsite you specify.
$instance = $instances | where {$_.Title -eq ”}
#Sets the $instance variable to the app with the title you supply.
Uninstall-SPAppInstance -Identity $instance
#Uninstalls the app from the subsite.
At the question “Are you sure you want to perform this action?”,
type Y to uninstall the app.
Locate and remove app instances in all locations
An app for SharePoint in the App Catalog is available for users to install.Users can install apps for SharePoint on many sites. Below two Windows PowerShell scripts can be used to find all locations for a specific app and then uninstall all instances from every location.
First script to locate all instances of a specific app in a SharePoint environment. Then use the second script to uninstall all instances of the app from the SharePoint environment.
To locate specific apps by using Windows PowerShell (save as script and run script)
Verify that you have the following memberships:
- securityadmin fixed server role on the SQL Server instance.
- db_owner fixed database role on all databases that are to be updated.
- Administrators group on the server on which you are running Windows PowerShell cmdlets.
An administrator can use the Add-SPShellAdmin cmdlet to grant permissions to use SharePoint 2013 cmdlets
save the below script as “Get-AppInstances.ps1”
This Windows PowerShell script gets all app instances from your SharePoint 2013 farm for a specified App ID on a specified web application. You specify the App ID and the web application URL and the script will remove all of the instances of the App for all webs in that web application.
param(
[Parameter(Mandatory=$true)] [Guid] $productId,
[Parameter(Mandatory=$true)] [String] $webAppUrl
)
function GetAllInstances($productId = $null, $webAppUrl = $null)
{
$outAppName = "";
$sites = Get-SPSite -WebApplication $webAppUrl
$outWebs = @()
foreach($site in $sites){
if($site.AdministrationSiteType -ne "None"){
continue;
}
$webs = Get-SPWeb -site $site
foreach($web in $webs) {
$appinstances = Get-SPAppInstance -Web $web
foreach($instance in $appinstances) {
if($productId -eq $instance.App.ProductId) {
if ($outAppName -eq "") {
$outAppName = $instance.Title;
}
$outWebs += $web;
}
}
}
}
return ($outAppName,$outWebs)
}
Write-Host "This script will search all the sites in the webAppUrl for installed instances of the App."
$confirm = Read-Host "This can take a while. Proceed? (y/n)"
if($confirm -ne "y"){
Exit
}
$global:appName = $null;
$global:webs = $null;
{
$returnvalue = GetAllInstances -productId $productId -webAppUrl $webAppUrl;
$global:appName = $returnvalue[0];
$global:webs = $returnvalue[1];
}
);
$count = $global:webs.Count;
if($count -gt 0){
Write-Host "App Name:" $global:appName;
Write-Host "Product Id: $productId";
Write-Host "Number of instances: $count";
Write-Host "";
Write-Host "Urls:";
foreach($web in $global:webs) {
Write-Host $web.Url;
}
}
else {
Write-Host "No instances of the App with Product Id $productId found.";
}
return;
- Now Open “SharePoint 2013 Management Shell”
- Change to the directory where you saved the file.
- At the Windows PowerShell command prompt, type the following command:
./ Get-AppInstances.ps1 -productId -webAppUrl
To uninstall specific apps from all locations by using Windows PowerShell (save as script and run script)
Verify that you have the following memberships :
- securityadmin fixed server role on the SQL Server instance.
- db_owner fixed database role on all databases that are to be updated.
- Administrators group on the server on which you are running Windows PowerShell cmdlets.
An administrator can use the Add-SPShellAdmin cmdlet to grant permissions to use SharePoint 2013 cmdlets
save the below script as “Remove-App.ps1”
This Windows PowerShell script removes all app instances from your SharePoint 2013 farm for a specified App ID on a specified web application. You specify the App ID and the web application URL and the script will remove all of the instances of the App for all webs in that web application.
param(
[Parameter(Mandatory=$true)] [Guid] $productId,
[Parameter(Mandatory=$true)] [String] $webAppUrl
)
function RemoveInstances($productId = $null, $webAppUrl = $null)
{
$outAppName = "";
$sites = Get-SPSite -WebApplication $webAppUrl
$outWebs = @()
foreach($site in $sites){
if($site.AdministrationSiteType -ne "None"){
continue;
}
$webs = Get-SPWeb -site $site
foreach($web in $webs) {
$appinstances = Get-SPAppInstance -Web $web
foreach($instance in $appinstances) {
if($productId -eq $instance.App.ProductId) {
if ($outAppName -eq "") {
$outAppName = $instance.Title;
}
$outWebs += $web;
Write-Host "Uninstalling from" $web.Url;
Uninstall-SPAppInstance -Identity $instance -confirm:$false
}
}
}
}
return ($outAppName,$outWebs)
}
$confirm = Read-Host "This will uninstall all instances of the App and is irreversible. Proceed? (y/n)"
if($confirm -ne "y"){
Exit
}
$global:appName = $null;
$global:webs = $null;
{
$returnvalue = RemoveInstances -productId $productId -webAppUrl $webAppUrl;
$global:appName = $returnvalue[0];
$global:webs = $returnvalue[1];
}
);
$count = $global:webs.Count;
if($count -gt 0){
Write-Host "All the instances of the following App have been uninstalled:";
Write-Host "App Name:" $global:appName;
Write-Host "Product Id: $productId";
Write-Host "Number of instances: $count";
Write-Host "";
Write-Host "Urls:";
foreach($web in $global:webs) {
Write-Host $web.Url;
}
}
else {
Write-Host "No instances of the App with Product Id $productId found.";
}
return;
- Open SharePoint 2013 Management Shell
- Change to the directory where you saved the file.
- At the Windows PowerShell command prompt, type the following command:
./ Remove-App.ps1 -productId -webAppUrl
If the issue still persists like as below
“If you have an orphaned app in the initialized state on a site and you delete the site, Health Analyzer reports that there's an error and the auto-fix doesn't work.”
Apply CU November 2016 which will 100% resolve the issue
SharePoint Server 2013 (KB3127933)
SharePoint Foundation 2013 (KB3127930)