Search results matching tags 'PHP' and 'Administrators'

Lots of new software for IIS, ASP.NET, AJAX and PHP this week

bills — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 18:13:00 GMT

Wow, what a week of innovation for the Microsoft Web Platform. This week we released a ton of new software which, if you haven’t already, you’ve got to check out. Here is a quick overview:

IIS Search Engine Optimization v1 final release!

The IIS team shipped the final release of IIS SEO toolkit which makes it easier to optimize your Website for search engines. It acts like a mini-search engine on your computer, scans your site and then provides useful tips for how to improve the relevance of your site to search engines. This tool is now out of beta and available for download through Web PI.

ASP.NET MVC 2 beta!

The ASP.NET team has been hard at work on the second release of MVC, which is now available to beta test. Phil has a great blog post on the release with links to the download page, readme notes and the source code. There are a bunch of new features in MVC 2 including AsyncController, expression based helpers, improvements with client validation, all new areas support, and more. Read more on Phil’s blog.

ASP.NET AJAX Library beta!

The ASP.NET AJAX team also has some exciting news with the release of the ASP.NET AJAX Library beta. James has a terrific blog post with the news This is the first project accepted into the new CodePlex Foundation! (more on that later) The ASP.NET AJAX Library has a new portal at www.asp.net/ajaxlibrary with tutorials, samples, and more. Read James’ post about the news and check it out!

IIS Application Request Router 2 final release!

The IIS team also released the final version of the IIS Application Request Router v2. This is a super powerful module that provides routing and load balancing capabilities for Windows and IIS. It makes it easy to create and manage an entire cluster of Web servers. Mai-lan has a lot of info on the release in her blog post and you can download ARR v2 using Web PI today.

PHP WinCache module final release - faster PHP on Windows!

The PHP team announced today the final release of the Windows Cache Extension for PHP, or WinCache for short, which makes PHP run much, much faster on Windows. The iBuildings guys released a benchmark showing how the WinCache extension speeds up PHP by as much as 2x over standard PHP. The other exciting part of this announcement is that the sources for the extension are now available under an open source BSD license and the source code is maintained and host on http://pecl.php.net/packages/wincache/ If you install PHP using Web PI, you automatically get WinCache.

Find New IIS7 Extensions at http://www.iis.net/extensions/

bills — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 22:55:00 GMT

I’m happy to announce that IIS7 Extensions have found their home at http://www.iis.net/extensions

Every since IIS7 shipped 9 months ago, the IIS team has been cranking away adding new features to the platform. Last time I blogged about how we do this, I realized we didn’t have a single place to learn about all of them, so I kicked off an effort within the team to create this. Now that the pages are up, it is amazing to see how many new capabilities are already available on top of IIS7…which all by itself had more new features than any other IIS release in the history of the product. It is a testament to not only the ingenuity and hard work of the IIS team, but a real validation that IIS7 is not just a Web server, it is a server platform. All of these new features are built on top of public extensibility points that any developer can use, and provide a seamless runtime, configuration and administration experience that looks and feels like they were built into the product to begin with! Here they are:

Landing page: http://www.iis.net/extensions

http://www.iis.net/AdministrationPack

http://www.iis.net/ApplicationRequestRouting

http://www.iis.net/BitRateThrottling

http://www.iis.net/DatabaseManager

http://www.iis.net/FTP

http://www.iis.net/IISManager

http://www.iis.net/PowerShell

http://www.iis.net/SmoothStreaming

http://www.iis.net/URLRewrite

http://www.iis.net/UrlScan

http://www.iis.net/WebDeploymentTool

http://www.iis.net/WebPlaylists

http://www.iis.net/WebDAV

Check out the more than a dozen new features available today! Over the next few weeks we’ll be adding video demos of each feature and more new content. Stay tuned for many cool new features to come!

IIS7 URL Rewrite Extension is finished – download now!

bills — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 01:04:56 GMT

I’m excited to announce that the IIS7 URL Rewrite extension is finished and available for download. For more information on some last minute features we added, and how to download it, see Ruslan’s blog post here: http://blogs.iis.net/ruslany/archive/2008/11/10/url-rewrite-module-release-to-web.aspx

Many, many, many customers have asked me for URL Rewrite capabilities over the years, and I’m happy to finally provide a high performance, reliable, and fully supported solution from Microsoft. URL Rewrite has many very cool features for Web applications and makes managing URL Rewrite rules easier to create and manage than any other solution out there. If you have IIS7, and you care about having clean URLs that search engines love to index, you need URL Rewrite. Download it today!

Quick Install of the World’s Most Popular Web Applications on IIS7

bills — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 00:48:00 GMT

A few weeks ago I announced the availability of the Microsoft Web Platform Installer (Web PI) in Beta. Web PI makes it easy to obtain and install the Microsoft Web Platform, including IIS, ASP.NET, Visual Web Developer Express, SQL Express and tons of other great IIS and other platform extensions in a single place. The Microsoft Web Platform provides everything you need to develop, deploy, host and operate powerful Web applications.

Speaking of powerful Web applications, today I’m excited to announce another tool that makes installing some of the world’s most popular ASP.NET and PHP applications on IIS7 a snap! The Microsoft Web Application Installer (Web AI) is a companion to Web PI, and provides a super easy way to download, install and configure many popular community and open source applications on IIS7. Available applications include DotNetNuke, Drupal, Gallery, Graffiti, osCommerce, PHPBB, and Wordpress, with more on the way. If you decide to try some of the PHP applications, you may want to check out this recent blog post on how to get PHP and MySQL installed as well. Try out Web AI today!

Web AI downloads each application from its original source, so if the application is updated, you know that Web AI will be pointing to the latest and greatest bits. In addition, Web AI will check for the presence of prerequisite components before installing the application, and after installation, it will offer configuration pages so that you can set up an associated database (another great reason why we included both SQL Server 2008 Express and the SQL Server driver for PHP in Web PI) and if needed, personalize your application by entering credentials and setting application options.

Remember, this is just a beta release, so you can expect to see more functionality and even greater integration as we update this tool in the months to come. And as with Web PI, we have created a Web AI forum where you can discuss Web AI and provide feedback or make suggestions to us, so do let us know what you think.

URL Rewrite module for IIS7

bills — Sat, 31 May 2008 22:33:00 GMT

One of the most hotly requested features for IIS is now available! Yesterday we shipped the first technical preview of a new URLrewrite module for IIS7. It is free for all IIS7 users and available for download x86 and x64. Thomas and Carlos have blogged about many of the details already, so be sure and check their posts out. Ruslan also posted a bunch of really great walkthroughs on IIS7, which you can check out here, including:

Creating rewrite rules for the URL Rewrite Module

This walkthrough will guide you through how to create and test a set of rewrite rules for the URL rewrite module.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Enabling Pretty Permalinks in WordPress

This walkthrough will guide you through how to enable “Pretty Permalinks” for blog posts in the WordPress blog engine installed on IIS 7.0.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Using Failed Request Tracing to Trace Rewrite Rules

IIS 7.0 Failed Request Tracing (FRT) is a powerful tool for troubleshooting request-processing failures.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Using Global and Distributed Rewrite Rules

This walkthrough will explain the different types of rules supported by URL rewrite module and will guide you through how to configure global and distributed rewrite rules.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Using Rewrite Maps in URL Rewrite Module

This walkthrough will introduce you to the concept of rewrite maps in URL rewrite module and will guide you how to create rewrite rules that use rewrite maps.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Importing Apache mod_rewrite Rules

IIS 7.0 URL rewrite module provides rule importing functionality that greatly simplifies the process of converting Apache mod_rewrite rules to IIS URL rewrite rules.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ruslan also has a full configuration reference for URLrewrite in this article: URL Rewrite Module Configuration Reference. Last, if you run into any problems or have a question about URLrewriting, be sure to check out the URLrewrite forum on http://forums.iis.net/.

Also note, there is a great partner solution available from Helicon Tech called IsapiRewrite. This ISAPI-based solutions works well on IIS5/6/7 and provides a more complete set of rewriter functionality. If you're not happy with the URLrewrite module for IIS7 or you're looking for a URLrewrite feature that works on all versions of IIS, check out IsapiRewrite.

IIS7 Videos on Channel 9

bills — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 03:30:00 GMT

Remote Administration and Delegation in IIS7
In this screencast, we configure our IIS7 server for remote administration and delegation. The remote administration service in IIS7 is a new and powerful feature that allows us to connect securely to our remote IIS server using a firewall-friendly SSL connection. Additionally, we can choose to use traditional Windows accounts for authentication or choose the new IIS Manager user accounts instead.

We will walk through the steps you must perform as the IIS administrator as well as the experience for a remote administrator using delegated features.

Failed Request Tracing on IIS7
In this screencast, we see how to configure our IIS7 server for Failed Request Tracing (sometimes called FREB). Failed Request Tracing is a powerful new capability in IIS7 that allows us to easily set rules on our web applications, that once triggered will log that request to disk and pull in all the relevant trace information. This feature is immensely useful for troubleshooting running applications where attaching a debugger is impractical.

Installing PHP Applications on IIS7
In this screencast, discover how easy it is to get PHP up and configured on your IIS7 webserver using FastCGI. The popular PHP-based blogging application, Wordpress, is used to demonstrate.

Additionally, we see how quickly and easily we can integrate a PHP app with IIS7's integrated pipeline as we convert Wordpress to use IIS7's built-in Forms Authentication.

IIS7 in the Community...11/7/2007

bills — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 22:32:00 GMT

The IIS7 community is growing! There have been a number of really cool things going on in the community around IIS7. Here are some of my favorites:

New Web Control Panels for IIS7!

I was very excited to see two new control panels for IIS7 hit the market this past month. I was excited to see the DotNetPanel guys be one of the first to market with an update of their DotNetPanel product for IIS7. They have a demo on their site you can try out now, or go download a copy for free (up to 10 sites!) The reviews on the download page look good. I was also excited when big-name vendor SWSoft released an update to their Plesk product for Windows v 8.3 beta which also supports IIS7. These guys are used all over the place in giant Web hosters, and having IIS7 support pre-launch is a really great sign. You can download their latest beta here.

New IIS7 Administration Tool Add-ons!

Rakki of the IIS/ASP.NET support team has published some really great IIS7 Admin Tool extensions that you may want to check out, including a new backup/restore UI extension, an IISRESET UI feature, and a diagnostics UI Module (called FREBUIModule).

How to install MySQL, PHP and PHPMyAdmin on IIS

With the introduction of FastCGI on IIS, running PHP on Windows is now a great experience. I ran across this great blog post by Shabbir which provides step-by-step instructions for how to get IIS, PHP, MySQL and PHPMyAdmin up and running.

Running 32bit and 64bit Side-by-Side in IIS7

For some odd reason I thought everyone already knew this, but I saw it pop up on blogosphere and quite a few people have cross-posted so I thought I better as well. Yes, it is now possible with IIS7 to run 32bit and 64bit AppPools side-by-side. Check out Rakki's blog for the scoop: http://blogs.msdn.com/rakkimk/archive/2007/11/03/iis7-running-32-bit-and-64-bit-asp-net-versions-at-the-same-time-on-different-worker-processes.aspx

Making PHP Applications Great on IIS7

Wow, this is a killer post by Drew Robbins on IIS7 extensibility in action for a PHP application. He shows off running Qdig, a popular PHP photo applications, using built-in forms authentication and the integrated pipeline, extensible configuration support, and a UI extension. It rocks!

Fun with http.sys caching

This is a great blog post by Rick James, IIS developer, on how the http.sys cache works and the kinds of performance benefits it provides.

Book Review: IIS7 Implementation and Administration

Andrew Westgarth provides a nice write-up of this new book by John Paul Mueller. If you're interested in purchasing a book on IIS7, check out this write-up and the growing list of IIS7 books on Amazon.com. I'm anxiously waiting for my copy of this 700 page monster.

Finding your way around IIS7 configuration sections with AppCmd

Mike Volodarsky writes up a great post on how to figure out the dozens of IIS (hundreds if you count ASP.NET) configuration sections and how to use them.

How to install VMWare Web Management on IIS7

This great post on AngryPets shows how to setup VMWare's Web Management Application for IIS7 and Windows Server 2008.

How to install IIS7 and PHP with FastCGI - ScreenCast

And last, but not least, Scott Hanselman published this great screencast of how to get PHP working on IIS7.

Happy Reading!

Microsoft Announces Interoperability Improvements for PHP and Microsoft technologies

bills — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 14:54:00 GMT

Last year at ZendCon 2006, I was invited to be a part of the Microsoft and Zend announcement initiating technical collaboration with the PHP community to significantly enhance the reliability and performance of PHP on Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008. As part of this collaboration, the IIS product group has delivered a new component for IIS6 and IIS7 called FastCGI Extension which enables IIS to much more effectively host PHP applications.

Today, I am back at ZendCon, invited to be a part of the Keynote presentation to provide an update on the Zend/Microsoft collaboration project and make several new announcements related to improving interoperability of PHP and Microsoft technologies.

First, Zend and Microsoft will continue work on FastCGI and scalable PHP hosting on Windows Servers. Specifically, Zend has committed to redistribute FastCGI in Zend Core, its certified PHP 5 offering. In addition, Zend will ensure that Zend Core fully supports the Server Core installation option for Windows Server 2008, allowing their optimized PHP to be hosted on the most streamlined version of Windows Server ever released.

Second, Zend and Microsoft are a strategic partnership to enable support for Information Cards by PHP developers through a component built for Zend Framework.

Third, Microsoft is announcing the availability this week of the first Community Technology Preview (CTP) of the SQL Server 2005 Driver for PHP. The PHP Driver delivers an API designed to enable reliable, scalable integration with SQL Server for PHP applications deployed on the Windows platform. Microsoft envisions working together with Zend and the PHP Community to ensure that the SQL Server 2005 Driver for PHP is a great offering for PHP developers and part of Zend’s core PHP offering.

Some more details on the announcements:

FASTCGI/IIS

· The next release of Zend Core, Zend’s certified version of PHP 5, will redistribute Microsoft’s FastCGI, ensuring for all of Zend’s Windows customers, that PHP is as reliable and scalable as possible on Windows Servers.

· Zend Core will support the Server Core installation option of Windows Server 2008, allowing Zend’s customers to run PHP on Windows in the most streamlined and secure environment possible.

· FastCGI is available for IIS 5.1/IIS 6.0 as a Go Live release, meaning customers have a free license to deploy this production-quality release on Windows Server 2003 today.

· FastCGI will ship in Windows Server 2008 as a built-in IIS component for the first time, sparing customers the hassle of downloading, installing and patching 3^rd party products.

· Microsoft embraces PHP hosting on Windows by building the enabling technology but also by working with the PHP community to ensure that popular PHP applications will run performantly on the Windows platform.

· For more information regarding FastCGI or PHP on Windows, visit http://www.iis.net/php.

SQL SERVER 2005 DRIVER FOR PHP

· On Tuesday, Microsoft is announcing the availibility this week of the first Community Technology Preview (CTP) of the SQL Server 2005 Driver for PHP. As part of Microsoft’s continued commitment to interoperability, the PHP Driver provides an optimized way for developers to leverage SQL Server 2005 in their PHP application.

· With this Driver, we are proud to address the needs of customers who have asked for a Microsoft-supported solution, and bring SQL Server’s scalability to PHP developers.

· The Driver is implemented as a procedural direct extension (also referred to as [])

· Microsoft envisions working together with Zend and the PHP Community to ensure that the SQL Server 2005 Driver for PHP is a great offering for PHP developers and part of Zend’s core PHP offering.

CARDSPACE

· Microsoft Corp. today announced at ZendCon a strategic partnership with Zend Technologies that will ultimately provide people with better control over their personal information on the Web and greatly improve the trustworthiness of Web-based interactions.

· The strategic partnership will enable support for Information Cards by PHP developers through a component built for Zend Framework (Zend’s open source PHP application framework for developing Web applications and Web services).Using this component standalone or as part of the framework, PHP developers will be able to specify a Web site’s security policy and accept information cards from trusted third parties.

· Zend is producing an implementation of the Windows CardSpace authentication mechanism called Zend_Infocard, which will enable Web sites to validate CardSpace authentication tokens submitted to the Web site. Windows CardSpace enables users to provide their digital identities in a familiar, secure and simple way.

For additional information, read the Zend Press Release.

How to install PHP on IIS

bills — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 01:36:00 GMT

*Updated Recommendations - Please read the following instructions for running PHP fast and reliably*

The FASTEST and EASIEST way to install PHP on IIS is using Microsoft’s Web Platform installer. It completely automates setting up IIS, FastCGI and the latest version of PHP from the php.net site. To install it, just click this button:

If you don’t have Web PI v2 installed, you will be prompted to install it. Once installed, the tool will launch. You can either navigate to the “Web Platform” tab and select “PHP” under “Framework and Runtimes” customize link, or close your browser, re-open to this blog and click the button again to launch the tool directly into PHP install.

For step-by-step instructions on how to install PHP on IIS6 (Windows 2003) with the new Microsoft FastCGI module, see Configuring FastCGI Extension for IIS 6.0.

For step-by-step instructions on how to install PHP on IIS7 (Windows Vista SP1 and Windows 2008) see, Using FastCGI to Host PHP Applications on IIS 7.0

My original blog post follows below and provides instructions for how to install IIS7 on Vista (RTM) using the ISAPI-based PHP. I strongly recommend you upgrade to Vista SP1, however, and use the Using FastCGI to Host PHP Applications on IIS 7.0 instead.

Here is a step-by-step guide for Vista RTM:

1) Download PHP from http://www.php.net/downloads.php. I get the zip package because I think it is just as easy, and gives me control over setup.

2) Unzip the php...zip file to your drive. I usually unzip it to C:\php

3) Copy the c:\php\php.ini-dist file to c:\windows\php.ini. Tweak it as needed.

4) Install IIS7, making sure you install the ISAPI Extension component (for PHP-ISAPI - which is what I use) or the CGI component (if you prefer CGI) during IIS installation (ISAPI and CGI are *not* installed by default)

5) Open the IIS Manager (C:\windows\system32\inetsrv\inetmgr.exe

6) Click on "Handler Mappings"

(click here for full size image)

7) Click on the "Add Script Map" task on the right (in blue):

(click here for full size image)

8) Fill in the dialog box like this:

9) Pause to enjoy this handy dialog box that I had added late in RC1 just for you, then click "yes"

If you click "Yes" it will automatically register this ISAPI /CGI with the extension restriction list - the feature we added in IIS6 to prevent unauthorized executables from running on the server. This saves time, and considering the fact that you're adding the scriptmap, it's a safe bet you want it to run. :)

10) go to your C:\inetpub\wwwroot directory and create a test.php page. You can use the simple

<?php phpinfo(); ?>

function to test if PHP is working correctly.

Enjoy!

Adddendum: several people have commented below that they are having problems getting PHP sessions to work on IIS7/Vista. Please see this post for more information on the issue.

Another note: PHP users may wish to try out the recently announced FastCGI support from Microsoft for improved reliability and performance. See this post for more information on the announcement, and this post for a demo of the new feature.