Managed Metadata Service fails to work and missing AppPool, Round 2

As you might recall from this post, I have been trying to figure out why provisioning a Managed Metadata Service keeps failing. I know that my AppPool isn't getting created, which is strange, as SharePoint is usually good about creating AppPools whenever it asks you if you'd like one.


As my first two attempts both attempts ended with the same issue, I decided to try some different approaches. For my third attempt, I still chose to create the service myself (as opposed to using the Farm Configuration Wizard), but rather than selecting a new AppPool, I chose an existing one, SharePoint Web Services. Surprise, surprise, that doesn't work either. Exact same error message, even though we know this AppPool exists.

In frustration, I restored from a snapshot again, but this time used the Farm Configuration Wizard with only the Managed Metadata Service checked. At the step for creating a Site Collection, I clicked Skip. And magically, it worked. How interesting that I can't use the GUI to provision a service but the wizard can. I decided to poke around and see what was different.

So far I've noticed:

In IIS

• An AppPool with a GUID name, running with the Managed Account I specified in the wizard.
• If I right click on the AppPool and choose "View Applications" I see a Virtual Directory that points to  C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office Servers\14.0\WebServices\Metadata.
• The Virtual Directory lives under the SharePoint Web Services site.
• An AppPool named "SharePoint - 80", also running with that Managed Account.
• If I right click on this AppPool and choose "View Applications", I see a site that points to C:\inetpub\wwwroot\wss\VirtualDirectories\80

In Central Administration

• A new Web Application, "SharePoint - 80", corresponding to the site in IIS
• There are no site collections in this Web Application, which is to be expected since I skipped that step in the wizard.
• Under Manage Service Applications, my Managed Metadata Service is now listed.
• Clicking on the Managed Metadata Service under Manage Service Applications displays the management screen without any errors.

In SQL Server

• A new database, named "Managed Metadata Service_{GUID}", with a very unattractive GUID in the name, of course.

So, there are two possible choices for what caused the magic, and it could be both of them. It's possible I have to create the AppPool myself. I find this unlikely, however, as the screen to provision the Managed Metadata service does prompt me to create the AppPool. I'm going to take SharePoint at its word that it is capable of creating this. The other possibility is that even if there is no existing Site Collection in your Farm, you at least need a Web Application created before you can provision the Managed Metadata service.

I plan on digging through the code of the Farm Configuration Wizard later to determine which of those steps was key.