Monday, January 21, 2013

FIM 2010 R2 Lab on Windows 7

I recently went about building out a FIM Lab on Windows 7 (64 bit).  Its completely unsupported, but in case it helps anyone, here is what I had to do.

With the basic FIM 2010 R2 installation instructions in mind, I began by installing IIS and SQL Server 2008 R2 on my Windows 7 machine.  Since this environment is just for my own personal lab use, I created all of the needed users and groups locally on the box.  Now comes the first challenge, getting SharePoint installed which requires a Server OS.  In order to install WSS, I downloaded and installed a neat little application called WSSOnVista from Bamboo Nation. This application uses API hooking to intercept the GetVersionEx call, fooling the install into believing its running on Windows Server. I used WSSOnVista to install WSS 3.0 with SP2.  Be sure to follow the instructions listed on the Bamboo Nation site, including using the WSS Advanced install option and selecting the Web Front End server type.

You will then need to download and install Orca.  You can use Orca to edit the FIM MSI packages, removing the server version checking requirements. You will need to copy the FIM install bits to some media that they can be edited (like a local drive).  Begin by right clicking the Synchronization Service.msi file and then selecting the “Edit with Orca” option.  You will then need to locate and remove the server OS version Launch Condition.  Right click the appropriate Row and click on the Cut Row(s) or Drop Row option:

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Save your changes and launch the Synchronization Service.msi and install as you normally would.  You will need to perform a similar action on the Service and Portal.msi file, however, this time you are looking for the OSCheck under the CustomAction table.

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Again, save the changes made to the msi file and then use it to install the FIM Service and Portal as you normally would.

I haven’t encountered any issues running on Windows 7 yet, but will update this article if any come up.