BizTalk 2006: Business Activity Monitoring Portal Enabled But Not Configurable

Problem: If you are in the configuration screen of Microsoft BizTalk Server 2006 and you are configuring Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) Portal, you checked 'Enable BAM Portal" and you noticed that the Account and Windows Group options are still grayed out.

Cause: I suspect that if you have configured BAM Portal once from any server in the BizTalk Server group, the user account fields are disabled on the rest of the servers even though Enable BAM Portal option is still available.

Resolution: Reset BAMVRoot in the BAM config file: BAMConfig.xml and then run BM update-config

Used bm.exe to get the BAM configuration XML:

1. Open a command window
2. Go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft BizTalk Server 2006\Tracking
3. Type: bm.exe get-config -FileName:BAMConfig.xml

It specifies BAMVRoot so it appears someone configured BAMPortal before. Deleted this line:

1. <GlobalProperty Name="BAMVRoot">http://FOOBAR:80/BAM</GlobalProperty>

Saved the file and updated the BAM configuration:

1. Open a command window
2. Go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft BizTalk Server 2006\Tracking
3. Type: bm.exe update-config -FileName:NewBAMConfig.xml

The options will no longer grayed out. You will probably get an error that the "BAMAppPool already exists". That is fine. Delete it, restarted IIS and it will be configured successfully.

As far as I can tell - this is not documentated very widely and this has helped me so I hope it helps someone out there as well.