Power BI Server file permissions and access to logs

[jan67]

Running into a strange error. Have a new install of Power BI Server which is installed in a corprate DC with very restrictive access.  The install has the PBIRS directory secured. I asked for read permissions to access the logs to troubleshoot an issue with emails failing. When the permissions were changed the server stopped working, not being able to access the Web Service. Thought it was a coincendence with something I might have done but after a reinstall and configuration to get things working the same thing happened when changing directory permissions. I'm at a loss on what's happening, I need to change the logging to verbose and access the logs. Thoughts on what's happening?

[d_gosbell · Accepted solution]

From your description my best guess would be that somehow in the change of permissions that the service account for the web service has somehow lost the permissions it needs to be able to write to the log folder. One of the first things the service does when it start is to initialize the logging and write out some startup messages. You might find some errors relating to this in the Windows Event log or you might need to use a tool like the SysInternals Process Monitor to figure out which permissions are missing.