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How to use Web Site Administration Tool without installing VS 2005

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Hello everyone!! This one is a tweak to ensure that you are able to Administer your ASP.NET 2.0 web-site *without* installing Visual Studio 2005 on your IIS Server.

For that, you would need Framework 2.0 installed on your Server. If you don't have it, please install it from https://msdn.microsoft.com/netframework/downloads/updates/default.aspx.

Now, follow the instructions below...

1) In the box where you have VS 2005 installed, open an application which you want to Administer.
2) I am using File System to open the website and have called it WebSiteAdminister
3) Click on the ASP.NET Configuration button in your Solution Explorer's toolbox
4) Copy the URL (in my case, it is... https://localhost:2002/asp.netwebadminfiles/default.aspx?applicationPhysicalPath=C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\WebSiteAdminister\&applicationUrl=/WebSiteAdminister)
5) Now, go to the IIS Box where you don't have VS 2005 installed
6) Open IIS console (Click on Start -> Run, type Inetmgr and click OK)
7) Right-Click on your Default Web Site and say New -> Virtual Directory
8) Click on Next, give an Alias (WebSiteAdmin) and click Next
9) In the Directory text box browse to... "C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\ASP.NETWebAdminFiles" and click Next, Next and Finish
10) Right-click on WebSiteAdmin and hit properties
11) Click on the ASP.NET Tab and select 2.0.50727 as ASP.NET Version and click Ok
12) Copy the content of the website from the Development box to the IIS Server (I did it at "c:\inetpub\wwwroot\WebSiteAdminister" )
13) Open an instance of Internet Explorer and in the Address Bar type... https://localhost/WebSiteAdmin/default.aspx?applicationPhysicalPath=C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\WebSiteAdminister\&applicationUrl=/WebSiteAdminister
14) You should be able to see ASP.NET Web Site Administration Tool (You can bookmark this so that you don't have to remember that string)
15) As you can see, we have removed the port number (2002) and changed asp.netwebadminfiles to our application WebSiteAdmin.

By the way, just to bring it to your notice, Administering you web site using the above technique is NOT supported at Microsoft. For support options at Microsoft, please visit... https://www.microsoft.com/services/microsoftservices/srv_support.mspx

Hope that helps!!

Comments

  • Anonymous
    March 09, 2006
    Trackback from dotnetkicks.com

  • Anonymous
    April 11, 2006
    Excellent. It actually works. Well done.

  • Anonymous
    May 18, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    May 30, 2006
    How to use Web Site Administration Tool without installing VS 2005 -

    Rahul,

    I have created the Web Site Adminitrations directory and IIS configuations. I have selected

    http://10.0.0.6/UCTInternal/webstieadmin/default.aspx?applicationPhysicalPath=C:Inetpubwwwroottracker&applicationUrl=/UCTInternal/trackit

    http://10.0.0.6/UCTInternal/trackit

    and get this message. Could you help????

    An error was encountered. Please return to the previous page and try again.

    The following message may help in diagnosing the problem: System.ArgumentOutOfRangeException: Specified argument was out of the range of valid values. Parameter name: site at System.Web.Configuration.WebConfigurationHost.InitForConfiguration(String& locationSubPath, String& configPath, String& locationConfigPath, IInternalConfigRoot configRoot, Object[] hostInitConfigurationParams) at System.Configuration.Configuration..ctor(String locationSubPath, Type typeConfigHost, Object[] hostInitConfigurationParams) at System.Configuration.Internal.InternalConfigConfigurationFactory.System.Configuration.Internal.IInternalConfigConfigurationFactory.Create(Type typeConfigHost, Object[] hostInitConfigurationParams) at System.Web.Configuration.WebConfigurationHost.OpenConfiguration(WebLevel webLevel, ConfigurationFileMap fileMap, VirtualPath path, String site, String locationSubPath, String server, String userName, String password, IntPtr tokenHandle) at System.Web.Configuration.WebConfigurationManager.OpenWebConfigurationImpl(WebLevel webLevel, ConfigurationFileMap fileMap, String path, String site, String locationSubPath, String server, String userName, String password, IntPtr userToken) at System.Web.Configuration.WebConfigurationManager.OpenMappedWebConfiguration(WebConfigurationFileMap fileMap, String path) at System.Web.Administration.WebAdminPage.OpenWebConfiguration(String path, String appPhysPath, Boolean getWebConfigForSubDir) at System.Web.Administration.WebAdminPage.OpenWebConfiguration(String path, Boolean getWebConfigForSubDir) at System.Web.Administration.WebAdminPage.VerifyAppValid()

  • Anonymous
    June 19, 2006
    Your article is prety nice. It's a pity that i didn't see it more later.

  • Anonymous
    August 09, 2006
    It still doesn't work for http://www.website.com/WebSiteAdminister/default.aspx?......

    You get the errors described above.. but it does work if you use http://webserver/WebSiteAdminister/default....  so how can you get the web admin tool to work from out side of the network..?

  • Anonymous
    August 09, 2006
    Well, as far as I know, you can't get it working from outside of the Network, because Integrated Windows Authentication is required and it is not supported in the Internet mode.

  • Anonymous
    August 10, 2006
    hi thanks for the tip!

    I installed .NET2 in IIS 5 (Win 2000) and your tip work flawlessly!

    tq very much!

  • Anonymous
    August 22, 2006
    Hi,

    I followed the above instructions and could not get mine to work.

    Preface on my app: My ASP.Net 2.0 application's name is AAA MASP. It is already installed on IIS under the virtual directory 'AAA MASP' and it's default page is login.aspx. So, 'http://localhost/AAA MASP/login.aspx' brings up the starting page right and my app works great, no problem there.

    My asp.net membership objects have been created inside the same SQL database hosting my application data using the aspnet_regsql.exe utility.

    This is the URL that comes up on my laptop when I launch ASP.Net 2.0 configuration from my application:

    http://localhost:2104/asp.netwebadminfiles/default.aspx?applicationPhysicalPath=C:Documents%20and%20SettingsAdministratorMy%20DocumentsVisual%20Studio%202005WebSitesAAA%20MASP&applicationUrl=/AAA%20MASP



    I performed the following steps:

    i) I created the virtual directory WebSiteAdmin on the default website
    with the directory pointing to 'C:WindowsMicrosoft .NetFrameworkv2.0.50727ASP.NETWebAdminFiles'
    ii) I chose it to use ASP.Net 2.0 version (do I change the default page to default.aspx?)
    iii) I copied the contents of 'C:Documents and SettingsAdministratorMy DocumentsVisual Studio 2005WebSitesAAA MASP' on my laptop to 'C:inetpubwwwrootWebSiteAdmin' on server
    iv) I launched http://localhost/WebSiteAdmin/default.aspx?applicationPhysicalPath=C:InetpubwwwrootWebSiteAdmin&applicationUrl=/WebSiteAdmin on the server, it keeps giving me the message 'Resource Not Found'

    What am I doing wrong? I am a newbie to IIS management beyond a basic level, just FYI. Please advise.






  • Anonymous
    February 01, 2007
    Jurka Rahikkala and kbrunet  are having the same problem. Rahul's instrucitons 1-4 are bad. in the querystring of the URL to the websiteadmin tool, the applicationPhysicalPath parameter must be set to the path of your website on the server, and applicaitonURL parameter must be set to the relative http path of your application.

  • Anonymous
    March 07, 2007
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 07, 2007
    Thanks everyone for chipping in!!

  • Anonymous
    March 26, 2007
    i had this problem. error message: an error was encountered. please return to the previous page and try again. cause of the problem.

  1. i had illegal characters on my website path.
  2. the directory of my website is too deep. solution:
  3. renamed my website path. (no illegal characters)
  4. changed my path to drive c:mywebsite (directory not too deep). when i ran the web administration tool again after the changes it worked fine. I really don't know if the illegal characters or deep directories was the cause of the error. as far as i know after the changes the tool worked. i hope this will help. good luck

  • Anonymous
    March 30, 2007
    Thank you so much, this saved me a lot of time. Once I figured out that I had to setup the security providers from the IIS Asp.Net tab (Edit Configuration), then the whole tool actually started to work.

  • Anonymous
    April 13, 2007
    One other possible solution: For debug purposes, I set my web project to output to an IIS site as opposed to the default debug web site. This broke the Web Site Administration Tool. Once I reverted my project back to the default debug behavior, the problem was resolved. At some point, I will publish the site to a more static model, but for development purposes, the above fix worked for me.

  • Anonymous
    July 21, 2007
    Excellent work! Great thanks to Magician

  • Anonymous
    July 21, 2007
    good work!

  • Anonymous
    July 24, 2007
    Getting this error when I click on the WSAT security tab: Could not load type 'System.Web.Administration.WebAdminModule'. The error is coming from web.config: <httpModules>    <add name="WebAdminModule" type="System.Web.Administration.WebAdminModule"/> </httpModules> Any thoughts?

  • Anonymous
    July 25, 2007
    Hi Terry, I haven't seen this error before. Although, I would like to know if you are running this application under 2.0? Did you check that? Also, can you share the complete error message that you get in your browser?

  • Anonymous
    August 12, 2007
    The resource cannot be found. whate we must be do

  • Anonymous
    December 12, 2007
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 13, 2008
    Magician's solution works. Thank so much magician :)

  • Anonymous
    July 28, 2008
    When I try to view the webSiteAdmin Site i get an Access Denied error. I know that it's some about my permission politics but i don't know how to resolve it. help please...

  • Anonymous
    October 15, 2008
    Your suggestion of adding a third parameter to return WebConfigurationManager.OpenMappedWebConfiguration(fileMap, path, "Default Web Site"); worked great but it seems you can add any random string and it still works. The problem I am having is that when I try to manage rules under security, I only see the application folder but no subfolders. I have 6 folders but they don't show up. Any ideas?

  • Anonymous
    December 18, 2008
    Thank you so much for providing this insight. This is great! I have one issue that I hope you can help resolve. Everything seems to work perfectly except for when I choose to Create a New User. When I do, I get the following error: An error was encountered. Please return to the previous page and try again. Do you have any idea why this is happening?

  • Anonymous
    January 07, 2009
    It seems the third option doesn't do anything but is required for using the OpenMappedWebConfiguration method.  Sounds like a bug....  ugh

  • Anonymous
    May 11, 2009
    This tip was awesome. It really helped.. Awesome Stuff

  • Anonymous
    November 16, 2009
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    December 10, 2009
    The comment has been removed