Web Administration Tools and Techniques

Web administrators will find that there are many ways to manage Web and application servers. The key administration tools and techniques are covered in the following sections.

Managing Resources by Using Key Administration Tools

Many tools are available for managing Web resources. Key tools you'll use are shown in Table 1-2. Most of these tools are available on the Administrative Tools menu. Click Start and choose All Programs, Administrative Tools, and then the tool you want to use. You can use all the tools listed in the table to manage local and remote resources. For example, if you connect to a new computer in IIS Manager, you can manage all its sites and services remotely from your system.

Table 1-2. Quick Reference for Key Web Administration Tools

Administration Tool	Purpose
Active Directory Users and Computers	Manages domain user, group, and computer accounts.
Computer Management	Manages services, storage, and applications. The Services And Applications node provides quick access to Indexing Service catalogs and IIS sites and servers.
Data Sources (ODBC)	Configures and manages Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) data sources and drivers. Data sources link Web front ends with database back ends.
DNS	Public Internet sites must have fully qualified domain names (FQDNs) to resolve properly in browsers. Use the Domain Name System (DNS) administrative snap-in to manage the DNS configuration of your Windows DNS servers.
Event Viewer	Allows you to view and manages events and system logs. If you keep track of system events, you'll know when problems occur.
Internet Information Services (IIS) 6.0 Manager	Manages Web and application server resources that were designed for IIS 6. This tool is included for backward compatibility only.
Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager	Manages Web and application server resources that were designed for IIS 7.0.
Web Management Service (WMSVC)	Allows you to use the IIS Manager to manage Web and application server resources on remote servers.
Reliability and Performance Monitor	Tracks system reliability and performance allowing you to pinpoint performance problems.
Services	Views service information, starts and stops system services, and configures service logons and automated recoveries.

When you add services to a server, the tools needed to manage those services are automatically installed. If you want to manage these servers remotely, you might not have these tools installed on your workstation. In that case, you need to install the administration tools on the workstation you're using.

Web Administration Techniques

Web administrators have many options for managing IIS. The key administration tools are:

• IIS Manager (InetMgr.exe)

• IIS Administration objects made available through the IIS 7.0 WMI provider

• IIS command-line administration tool (AppCmd.exe)

IIS Manager provides the standard administration interface for IIS. To start IIS Manager, click Start and choose All Programs, Administrative Tools, and then Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager. When started, IIS Manager displays the Start page shown in Figure 1-1 and automatically connects to the local IIS installation, if it's available. On the Start page, you have the following options:

• Connect to localhost Connects you to the IIS installation on the local computer

• Connect to a server Allows you to connect to a remote server

• Connect to a site Allows you to connect to a specific Web site on a designated Web server

• Connect to an application Allows you to connect to a specific Web application on a designated site and server

Figure 1-1. You can access servers, sites, and applications by using IIS Manager.

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As discussed previously, remote access to an IIS server is controlled by the WMSVC. When you install and start WMSVC on an IIS server, it listens on port 8172 on all unassigned IP addresses and allows remote connections from authorized user accounts. You can connect to a remote server by following these steps:

You can connect to a specific application on a designated site and server by following these steps:

As Figure 1-2 shows, IIS Manager has been completely redesigned for IIS 7.0. Instead of being a snap-in for the Microsoft Management Console, IIS Manager is now a stand-alone application with a browser-like interface. Once you connect to a server, site, or application, IIS Manager automatically connects to these installations upon startup.

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IIS 7.0 introduces the concept of delegated administration. With delegated administration, a machine administrator can delegate administrative control safely and securely. Delegated administration allows different levels of the configuration hierarchy to be managed by other users, such as site administrators or application developers. In a standard configuration, the default delegation state limits write access to most configuration settings to machine administrators only, and you must explicitly modify the delegation settings to grant write access to others.
IIS Manager and other graphical tools provide just about everything you need to work with IIS 7.0. Still, there are times when you might want to work from the command line, especially if you want to automate installation or administration tasks. To help you with all your command-line needs, IIS 7.0 includes the IIS command-line administration tool (AppCmd.exe). AppCmd.exe is located in the %SystemRoot%\System32\Inetsrv directory. By default, this directory is not in your command path. Because of this, you'll need either to add this directory to the default path or change to this directory each time you want to use this tool. Add this directory temporarily to your default path by typing the following at an elevated command prompt:

path %PATH%;%SystemRoot%\System32\inetsrv

Then add this directory permanently to your default path by typing the following at an elevated command prompt:

setx PATH %PATH%;%SystemRoot%\System32\inetsrv

Table 1-3 provides a summary of the core set of administration objects for the IIS command-line administration tool.

Table 1-3. Administration Objects for the IIS Command-Line Administration Tool

Object Type	Description	Related Commands
APP	Allows you to create and manage Web application settings by using related list, set, add, and delete commands	list, set, add, and delete
APPPOOL	Allows you to create and manage application pools by using related list, set, add, delete, start, stop, and recycle commands	list, set, add, delete, start, stop, and recycle
BACKUP	Allows you to create and manage backups of your server configuration by using list, add, delete, and restore commands	list, add, delete, and restore
CONFIG	Allows you to manage general configuration settings by using related list, set, search, lock, unlock, clear, reset, and migrate commands	list, set, search, lock, unlock, clear, reset, and migrate
MODULE	Allows you to manage IIS modules by using related list, set, add, delete, install, and uninstall commands	list, set, add, delete, install, and uninstall
REQUEST	Allows you to list current HTTP requests by using a related list command	list
SITE	Allows you to create and manage virtual sites by using related list, set, add, delete, start, and stop commands	list, set, add, delete, start, and stop
TRACE	Allows you to manage failed request tracing by using related list, configure, and inspect commands	list, configure, and inspect
VDIR	Allows you to create and manage virtual directory settings by using related list, set, add, and delete commands	list, set, add, and delete
WP	Allows you to list running worker processes by using a related list command	list

The basics of working with the IIS command-line administration tool are straightforward. Most administration objects support these basic commands:

• ADD Creates a new object with the properties you specify.

• DELETE Deletes the object you specify.

• LIST Displays a list of related objects. Optionally, you can specify a unique object to list, or you can type one or more parameters to match against object properties.

• SET Sets parameters on the object specified.

Some objects support other commands, including:

• RECYCLE Recycles the object you specify by deleting it and then re-creating it

• START Starts the object you specify if it is stopped

• STOP Stops the object you specify if it is started or otherwise active

To type commands, use the following basic syntax:

appcmd Command <Object-type>

where Command is the action to perform, such as list, add, or delete, and Object-type is the object on which you want to perform the action, such as app, site, or vdir. Following this, if you wanted to list the configured sites on a server, you could type the following command at an elevated command prompt:

appcmd list site

Because the IIS command-line administration tool will also accept plural forms of object names, such as apps, sites, or vdirs, you could also use:

appcmd list sites

In either case, the resulting output is a list of all configured sites on the server with their related properties, such as:

SITE "Default Web Site" (id:1,bindings:http/*:80:,state:Started)