Small Business Accounting 2008

A small project has given me a chance work with the Small Business Accounting Package from Microsoft.

I have been using it for my own compay for about 2 years (from the first BETA) and have been really impressed with it. But it's always run on a single PC using SQL Express, so I had no difficulty installing it and running/upgrading etc.

That was until i was asked to to set it up for a client on their network for multiple concurrent users on their Server 2003 network (I manage the network, no it inside out and assumed that it would be an simple few hours work....)

It wasn't at all, firstly the MS install step by step didn't really work, it was close, but no cigar.
I have spent +/-  2 days hunting out the answer, installing/re-installing the software on the server, dropping databases, manually making databases, permissions etc.

Here are the steps I did to make it all work.
Server is a Server 2003 R2, with SQL 2005 Std edition. PC is XP SP2 all on the same domain, subnet etc

1- Setup a network share (allow everyone if you want or ist of user/usergroups you want to have access) on the server machine and map a network drive on your PC to this folder
2- Make sure SQL 2005 Std or enterprise is set to accept remote connection
3- On te server install SBA 2008, but do a custom install by clicking the customize option (2nd or 3rd sreen in) and set the SQL instance to the SQL server you are intending on using, do no tset it to (local), use the serve name
4- Run SBA 2008, and create a new company (dont bother adding any data except name for the time being - in case you have to do this more than once)
5- In SBA enable mutli-user optin in [File] Menu, add all the users from active directory (or make sure you use the domain name and their domain username) you want to have access to the database and save the new .sbc file into the mapped drive
6- Install SBA on the PC and customis the install again, select the 'no database' option (bottom one) so you are only installing the client part onto the PC.

At this point it's worth trying to run SBA and open the .sbc file from the mapped drive, it may work, if not;

7- go to the server and open the SQL surface area config and make sure the database engine can be accessed renotely - TCPIP nad named pipes.

Try it again form the mapped .sbc, if no luck;

8- On the server open the SQL configuraton manager select the SQL server instance you are using and enable TCPIP and then dbl click on TCPIP. On the IP address tab set all the 'dynamic ports' to 5356.

This is where started to loose it, and found a small application called sox
it is a network handshake protocol tool that can check connectivity to a server/PC on any port, which I found was very helpful. Download and unzip the .exe into your C drive for ease of use then open it from teh command prompt c:\sox.exe /?

the syntax is pretty easy but the /? will show what you need to type, just remember to test the port we are using 5356.

If there is you can connect to your server with sox but not SBA then the issue may be user security related otherwise I tried these extra steps below.

9- Go to the mapped drive and open the .sbc with notepad (right click open with), it should look like this;

database=databasename
server=servername,5356

However by changing the server to the fully qualified name may help as will adding the instance to the mix.

database=databasename
server=servername.domain.local\MSSQLSERVER,5356

Save and open the .sbc by double clicking on it, now mine failed again here but after checking the dynamic ports in the SQL cong manager the IPALL one had been given a random port number, so I set it back to 5356 and SBA worked first time.


Bizarre, but maybe I forgot to set the IPALL port in the first place, one thing to remember is that everytime you add new users via the multi user tool you have to save the .sbc file, so keep a copy of the FQDN version to hand.


I hope this helps someone out or at least point them in the right direction, if anyone needs a hand contact me via the chillfire contact page and I will help them out.

goodluck,
craig

As always if you end up causing damage to yourself and/or anyone else or even an entire company I wont be held responsible, these are just guidelines that I found worked and may have a negative affect on your day.