SharePoint 2016 – Resolved issue : IIS sites are not created on one WFE in farm

SharePoint 2016 - Central Administration - Services on Server - Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application service stopped
SharePoint 2016 - Central Administration - Services on Server - Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application service stopped

Hi All,

Greetings for the day 🙂 LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL 🙂

Today new issue and solution 🙂

Background : We have migration project going on. We are migrating SharePoint 2013 application to SharePoint 2016 using content database attachment method. One of the step is creating web applications on destination server, i.e on our SharePoint 2016 server.

SharePoint 2016 Farm details : We have small farm

  • 2 WFEs
  • Application Server
  • DB Server

Issue : On one of the WFE web applications are created but respective IIS sites are not created

Cause :

  • We have verified SharePoint Administration Service – started
  • SharePoint Timer Service – started
  • After bit googling we found that on respective WFE service “Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application” is not started
SharePoint 2016 - Central Administration - Services on Server - Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application service stopped
Fig : SharePoint 2016 – Central Administration – Services on Server – Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application service stopped

Solution :

  • We just started this service on respective WFE
  • Wait for some time and we could see IIS sites are provisioned
  • But found that – status of service “Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application” is “starting” for long time. Restarted the IIS but no luck 🙁
  • Finally restarted the WFE – and status changed to “Started” mode 🙂
  • In case sometime status of service is still in “Starting” mode then execute the following CMDLET in SharePoint 2016 Management Shell
stsadm -o provisionservice -action start -servicetype spwebservice
 SharePoint 2016 - Executing CMDLET - stsadm -o provisionservice for changing the status of "Microsoft SharePoint Foundation WebApplication" service from "Starting" mode to "Started" mode
Fig : SharePoint 2016 – Executing CMDLET – stsadm -o provisionservice for changing the status of “Microsoft SharePoint Foundation WebApplication” service from “Starting” mode to “Started” mode

What is “Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Web Application” Service ?

  • This server provides web server functionality
  • This is the service which hosts our web applications in IIS
  • It should started by default on each web front server
  • This service should be started on all web front servers, batch-processing servers
  • This service should also be started on Distributed cache and Request management servers if those are separately implemented
  • Do not start this service on Application servers. If started please stop otherwise it will provision IIS sites for our web applications

Thanks for reading 🙂 If its worth at least reading once, kindly please like and share 🙂 SHARING IS CARING 🙂

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Enjoy the beautiful life 🙂 Have a FUN 🙂 HAVE A SAFE LIFE 🙂 TAKE CARE 🙂

Prasham Sabadra

LIFE IS VERY BEAUTIFUL :) ENJOY THE WHOLE JOURNEY :) Founder of Knowledge Junction and live-beautiful-life.com, Author, Learner, Passionate Techie, avid reader. Certified Professional Workshop Facilitator / Public Speaker. Scrum Foundation Professional certificated. Motivational, Behavioral , Technical speaker. Speaks in various events including SharePoint Saturdays, Boot camps, Collages / Schools, local chapter. Can reach me for Microsoft 365, Azure, DevOps, SharePoint, Teams, Power Platform, JavaScript.

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