Quoting one of the folks above, 'it sucks'. Given the concensus here, perhaps you might consider modifying the information in the documentation. If I were documenting (and I am not the best by far) I am certain I would say path and file rather than path to file.

Even as I write here, I find the whole thing murky. The wording here has a lot of semantic overtones. So path to file means - (what is the subject - oh, subject - path) and what else - a modifier of the subject. Two - the other interpretation - road to my house is a road. First, am I stupid enough to give them the road and not the house number? Answer, NO - I will include this information as a second piece of information. If I want someone to find my house, I give them the road and specify the road number. The road to my house is a road, not a road and a specific house. Frankly, I don't know if it is enough just to have this many disagreements regarding the documentation but, quote frankly, The documentation relies on the opinion of the person writing the information. I have to agree with everyone on this documentation. Once you have found the name for the service account group, you can grant the proper permissions on Windows resources (such as write permissions on folders or read permissions on files you need to import). The name for the SQL Server 2005 groups should be based on the following pattern:įor example: SQLServer2005MSSQLUser$MY_SERVER$MSSQLSERVER You can find the name of this group in the local users and groups management tool in Windows (Computer Management tool).

Rather than granting permissions directly to this service account on local Windows resources, you can grant the permissions to the corresponding Windows group that SQL Server 2005 setup created for you. To check the name of the service account being used, you can use SQL Server Configuration Manager (SCM). Most likely you are running SQL Server using a low privileged domain account (which is highly recommended). In this case the permissions check are done by Windows to verify that the SQL Server service account has access to create the file.

Backup master key to file