The unattended service account is one that I did NOT find mentioned in the documentation for initial setup and configuration of SharePoint 2010 nor is it mentioned in some of the SharePoint 2010 admin books that I have. It was not until setting up some of the Service Applications that I came across the need for this account.
By definition from Microsoft the unattended service account is:
A single shared user account that is used to access all data sources. This is a low privileged domain account stored in the Secure Store Service. In establishing your unattended service account, first determine if this account has the proper access to the data sources that will be required in the Dashboard.
It is used by the Secure Store to provide credentials for the Business Intelligence service applications – Performance Point, Excel Services, and Visio Services.
The Secure Store provides access to data outside SharePoint Server 2010 (for example, SQL Server data) by impersonating the credentials of the user attempting to access the data. The unattended service account credentials are not cached globally. They are retrieved from the Secure Store only when needed.
More specific information on the unattended service account and the various BI service applications can be found at the links below.
Secure Store for Business Intelligence service applications
Filed under: Accounts, Error, SharePoint 2010 Tagged: | Service Account, SharePoint 2010, Unattended Service account
