Issues with creating Managed Metadata Service application in Sharepoint 2010

There are two most common issues related to creating a Managed Metadata Service Application in SharePoint 2010 that I have seen.

Issue #1 No service applications actually created in IIS

This can happen whether you do it in the GUI (Central Admin -> Manage Service Applications -> New -> Managed Metadata Service) or in Powershell (New-SPMetadataServiceApplication). The command runs successfully but nothing is added in IIS. If you click on the newly created Metadata service application on the ServiceApplications.asps page in Central Admin, you get this error in red on the termstoremanager.aspx page:

The Managed Metadata Service or Connection is currently not available. The Application Pool or Managed Metadata Web Service may not have been started. Please Contact your Administrator.

The problem is actually right there in the error message: “Managed Metadata Web Service” has not been started. Many of the service application instances rely on their hosting Service. So the service must be running in order for the instances to be created properly. When you click New on the Manage Service Applications page in Central Admin (ServiceApplications.aspx) you are creating an instance of a service application. So where are the actual services or service hosts? They are on the “Services on Server” page (Central Admin -> Manage services on server” under System Settings). In the above metadata service error case, go there and start the “Managed Metadata Web Service”, and the previously created yet not working Metadata Service Application instance will start functioning properly and IIS will show a new virtual application created in the “SharePoint Web Services” website. If you chose to also create a new app pool, the app pool will also show up now.


Issue #2 The service application does not have a connection associated with Central Admin

This typically happens if you create a Metadata Service application using Powerscript with minimum optional parameters, for example:

New-SPMetadataServiceApplication -ApplicationPool "SharePoint Service App AP" -Name "Managed Metadata Service 1" -DatabaseName "SharePoint_MetadataService1DB" -DatabaseServer "USTFSPOC01"

New-SPMetadataServiceApplicationProxy -Name "Managed Metadata Service 1 Proxy" -ServiceApplication "Managed Metadata Service 1"

So a new Metadata Service application is created using an existing app pool, and a proxy is also created. However, if you go to Central Admin Manage Service Applications page and click the link on this Metadata Service application, you’d get the following error:

The Service Application being requested does not have a Connection associated with the Central Administration web application

The error is because the proxy was created without being associated with a proxy group. The Central Admin site uses the Default Proxy Group. Go to Central Admin -> Application Management -> Configure service application associations -> click the “default” link in the Application Proxy Group column, it should show that “Managed Metadata Service 1 Proxy” is not checked. Check it and click OK. Now go to Central Admin Manage Service Applications page again and click the link on this Metadata Service application, it should show up successfully.