We apologize for any inconvenience, but we've made the site read only while we're making some improvements

Question

I did the back up of a site collection using the following command in powershell.

Backup-SPSite –Identity https://Testsite.com/ -path C:\SiteBackup\Test.bak 

But when I open the site in browser I got the message

"We apologize for any inconvenience, but we've made the site read only while we're making some improvements."

and the site is set to read only mode.

Answer 1

I have came across many such scenarios, this happens mainly due to powershell command being interrupted. To resolve this you can use following powershell script

$admin = new-object Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPSiteAdministration ("http://sharepoint/sites/sitecollection") $admin.ClearMaintenanceMode()

Once you execute this command it will make your site normal. Hope this helps.

Answer 2

This error message can be thrown when the SQL Server space, the SQL server logs or the SharePoint logs are full.

If this is the case then check to see how much space free in SQL Server. Check the SQL Server log location. Clear out the SQL Server logs if need be. Check the SharePoint log location. Clear out the SharePoint logs if need be.

The SharePoint and/or SQL Server instance may need to be rolled to remove the read only flag.

Answer 3

How to Solve:

WE APOLOGIZE FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE, BUT WE’VE MADE THE SITE READ ONLY WHILE WE’RE MAKING SOME IMPROVEMENTS.

I came across an interesting issue recently where our production sites flag notification for every user "We apologize for any inconvenience".

Symptoms:

This issues for regarding scheduled a backup task scheduler failed or interrupted for any resign,

I my case at the time of scheduler drive not have sufficient space. backup process was abnormally terminated.

This resulted all Sites being in Read only mode & the following message would show up when users browsed to the site.

We apologize for any inconvenience, but we’ve made the site read only while we’re making some improvements.

Go to “Site collection Quota & locks” in Central Admin & here is how the Status looks like. It is locked as “Read only” & all settings are grayed out weather you have administrator permission.

Here is more on this behavior & how to get out of this situation.

In SharePoint 2013, Microsoft introduced a property MaintenanceMode for SPSite object which indicates the site is undergoing a Maintenance & is read only. SPSite.MaintenanceMode flag can be set on a site for several reasons like content database is in read only state, or site collection is being upgraded, backed up or moved.

If a site gets into a state where the action that set this has terminated in a way where this is still set, we run into this situation.

Solutions:

The way to clear this flag notification is use the ClearMaintenanceMode method in SpSiteAdministration object. Here is how it can be done via SharePoint Management Shell.

Option Command 1:

#Run this command search site separately or run one by one all top level sites if we have multiple top level sites/ Web application.

# SiteName “http://m.com”.
$Admin = new-object Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPSiteAdministration(‘SiteName’) 

$Admin.ClearMaintenanceMode()
$site.MaintenanceMode

Option Command 2:

Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue

#Clears all the maintenance modes for all Site Collections in the farm.

$webapp = Get-SPSite -Limit ALL

foreach ($site in $webApp){ 
    $Admin = new-object Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPSiteAdministration($site.url)
    $Admin.ClearMaintenanceMode()
}

Answer 4

two ways to unlock the site collection.

• from central admin > application management > Configure quotas and locks > Select the Site collection from drop down...Now make sure the Radio Button "No Locked" is selected > hit ok

• run the powershell to unlock it.

  Set-SPSite -Identity "" -LockState "Unlock"

Answer 5

Did you fix this issue? Well I got into this mess when I ran a stsadm -o backup operation and I accidentally stopped the task in between.

Out of curiosity, I ran another stsadm backup operation and once it completed successfully, the site got unlocked.

Can someone confirm whether this will work if you lock the site via a diff powershell command?