Expert Insights: Why and How to Migrate to SharePoint SE

SharePoint 2016 Mainstream's end date came and went on the 13th July 2021 – We might have missed that in the chaos that was 2021. 

So, what is Mainstream Lifecycle?  This refers to the type of support available in the Fixed Lifecycle Policy.  And for SharePoint 2016 this means that since 13th July 2021 there will be no more “Request to change product design and features” & “Non-security updates”, while “Security updates” and Paid and Non-Paid support continue until July 14th, 2026.  

What does that mean? Well, to me at least, it means if you are in SharePoint 2016 you can get support on issues and if the product needs a patch that is not related to security, they will probably tell you to upgrade to 2019.  It also means that no new features will be released for 2016. 

At least security updates are available- if it ain’t broke, why fix it? I mean, upgrading to 2019 means the following won’t work anymore: 

Create the following accounts from the below lists and add the permissions as stated. 

1. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/install/account-permissions-and-security-settings-in-sharepoint-server-2016 

2. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/install/initial-deployment-administrative-and-service-accounts-in-sharepoint-server 

Now, there are going to be people out there that think installing everyone on one or two accounts will work, and it will work.  However you are setting yourself up for failure, you will find yourself unable to figure out how to debug anything if it goes wrong.  If your system is compromised you will find that those accounts will be easily leveraged to gain access to sensitive data.  And if one of those accounts are locked out or disabled, your entire world will end as you know it.  So, put the effort in and create the accounts, assign the permissions and do things the right way. 

Troubleshooting 

I mean WTF… I wonder how else I can do this? 

Trying Auto SPInstaller I get the following - https://github.com/brianlala/AutoSPInstaller  

That doesn’t work either – SharePoint Install Halted…. 

OK, now we really need to dig into the detail.  If I made changes to the config.xml I noticed that the setup.exe fails almost right away, so there must be something in that config causing the issue, or at least something I can use to fix the issue. 

And after playing around for a bit and creating a nice one-liner in PowerShell, there you have it, bada bing bada boom.

Start-Process “.\setup.exe” -ArgumentList “/config ‘”$configFile’” /IAcceptTheLiecenseTerms” -Wait -WindowStyle Minimized -RedirectStandardOutput c:\spinstall\setup-output.txt 

We are in action. 

We kick things off with “New-SPConfigurationDatabase -LocalServerRole Custom” after some faffing around, I might have forgotten to upgrade my SQL server (But we will fix that in post, so you might not see it, depends on my editor for the video) 

1. New-SPConfigurationDatabase -LocalServerRole Custom 

Then following the guide we have to run the following 

2. Update-SPFlightsConfigFile -FilePath "C:\Program Files\Common Files\microsoft shared\Web Server Extensions\16\CONFIG\SPFlightRawConfig.json" 

Now, time for New-SPCentralAdministration – However it would have been better to add the port number to find it easier in future. 

And there you have it – now you can run the Configuration Wizard from another machine using the browser of choice. 

In order to prevent information overload, this is where we'll stop. Stay tuned for Part 2, where we'll explore SharePoint SE Configuration and reveal valuable insights to streamline your transition.

If you're ready to take the next step in your SharePoint migration journey, GTconsult is here to guide you. Our experienced team is at the forefront of the modern workplace, and we're eager to partner with you.