RuslanY Blog

Today IIS team has released the FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1 – Release Candidate. This version is based on FastCGI Extension 1.0 and it adds several important improvements and features. The release is believed to have a quality level suitable for production deployments.

Install the Release Candidate of FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1

or, download:

FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1 – RC (x86)

FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1 – RC (x64)

Upgrade from FastCGI Extension 1.0 and 1.5 Beta releases

If you already have installed FastCGI Extension v1.0 or FastCGI Extesnion v1.5 Beta, then the installation package will upgrade it to version 1.5 – RC. All the related IIS configuration and settings in fcgiext.ini file will be preserved during upgrade. Note that during upgrade from v1.0 the comments in fcgiext.ini will not be updated and will not mention new configuration settings. However the new settings can still be used after upgrade. Continue Reading »

Today I have upgraded my blog to the recently released WordPress 2.8 and to PHP 5.3 RC3 (VC9 Non Thread Safe build). If you are running WordPress (or any other PHP application) on IIS 7, then there are several reasons why it may be beneficial for you to upgrade:

• PHP 5.3 has a number of Windows-specific bug fixes and improvements that address stability and functionality problems which existed before when running PHP on Windows. For detailed list of all the changes and fixes, refer to the news.txt file included within the PHP zip file.
• PHP 5.3 has been compiled with the latest version of C compiler (VC9), which makes it run faster on Windows than any previous versions of PHP (which were compiled with VC6).
• WordPress 2.8 has built-in support for IIS 7 URL Rewrite Module. Refer to IIS 7 URL Rewrite Module support in WordPress 2.8 for more details.

Overall, the upgrade went pretty smoothly and the only thing that was different from the usual process of setting up PHP on Windows was the date.timezone setting in php.ini file. Starting with PHP 5.3, this setting must be explicitly set, e.g.:

date.timezone = America/Los_Angeles

After this successful upgrade I guess it is time now “to reward myself by reading that book or an article that I’ve been putting off, or simply sitting back for a few moments and let the world pass me by”.

Have you tried upgrading to PHP 5.3 on IIS recently? What was your experience?

I am pleased to let everyone know that WordPress development community has added a built-in support for IIS 7 URL Rewrite Module in the upcoming WordPress 2.8 release. Starting with version 2.8 the Permalink Settings page will allow you to easily configure “Pretty Permalinks” URL structure when WordPress is running on IIS 7 with URL Rewrite Module v1.1 installed.

Here is how the process of updating Permalinks structure will look like in WordPress 2.8 on IIS 7: Continue Reading »

Since the Silverlight Media Player plugin for WordPress was published in January 2009, it has been downloaded more than 900 times. It is being used in many web sites all over the world – here are just a couple of examples: Tribord Amure par Matthieu and Os Taekwon-do Klubb. Today, a new update of the plugin has been released. This update makes it even easier to add video content to your blog posts and pages. Continue Reading »

Today IIS team has released the FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1 – Beta. This version is based on FastCGI Extension 1.0 and it adds several important improvements and features.

Install the Beta of FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1

or, download:

FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1 (x86)

FastCGI Extension 1.5 for IIS 6.0 and IIS 5.1 (x64)

Upgrade from FastCGI Extension 1.0 release

If you already have FastCGI Extension version 1.0 installed then the installation package will upgrade it to version 1.5. All the related IIS configuration and settings in fcgiext.ini file will be preserved during upgrade. Note that during upgrade the comments in fcgiext.ini will not be updated and will not mention new configuration settings. However the new settings can still be used after upgrade. Continue Reading »

Today IIS team has released the URL Rewrite Module 1.1 for IIS 7. This is an incremental update that contains fixes to the bugs found since the URL Rewrite Module v1.0 has been released in November 2008. If you have version 1.0 installed (file version of rewrite.dll is 7.1.315.0), it is highly recommended you upgrade to version 1.1.

Install the URL Rewrite Module 1.1 for IIS 7 today!

or, download:

Microsoft URL Rewrite Module 1.1 for IIS 7 (x86)

Microsoft URL Rewrite Module 1.1 for IIS 7 (x64)

Upgrade from URL Rewrite Module 1.0 release

If you have URL Rewrite Module version 1.0 installed, the installation package upgrades it to version 1.1. All rewrite rules in applicationHost.config and web.config files are preserved during upgrade process. Continue Reading »

This post describes some of the tips and tricks that one may find useful when solving URL-based problems for their web server or web site. Each tip/trick has a description of a problem and then an example of how it can be solved with IIS 7 URL Rewrite Module.

1. Add or Remove Trailing Slash

Many web applications use “virtual URLs” – that is the URLs that do not directly map to the file and directory layout on web server’s file system. An example of such application may be an ASP.NET MVC application with URL format similar to this: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/60857/modrewrite-equivalent-for-iis-7-0 or a PHP application with URL format that looks like this: http://ruslany.net/2008/11/url-rewrite-module-release-to-web/. If you try to request these URLs with or without trailing slash you will still get the same page. That is OK for human visitors, but may be a problem for search engine crawlers as well as for web analytics services. Different URLs for the same page may cause crawlers to treat the same page as different pages, thus affecting the page ranking. They will also cause Web Analytics statistics for this page to be split up. Continue Reading »

While the task of setting up PHP on IIS was not a difficult one, it anyway required a lot of manual installation and configuration steps. With the PHP 5.2.9-1 release the PHP development community has put a lot of improvements to the PHP installer to make it easy to setup PHP on IIS 5.1, IIS 6.0 and IIS 7.0. The latest PHP installer can be downloaded from the PHP community site.

Now, with the release of Microsoft Web Platform Installer 2.0 Beta (Web PI), the task of enabling PHP on Windows OS has become the easiest it has ever been. Here are the three simple steps you need to follow: Continue Reading »

With the addition of .NET Framework to Server Core in Windows Server 2008 R2 the Server Core installation option became even more appealing for those who want to use a very low footprint server for hosting their applications. Availability of .NET framework provides the following great benefits:

1. ASP.NET support – you can now use Server Core to host your ASP.NET applications.
2. IIS Remote Management – Server Core does not provide any user interface other than command line. But if you prefer to use IIS Manager UI to administer IIS, you can now use IIS Remote Manager to connect to IIS on Server Core and perform all the management tasks from within familiar UI of IIS Manager.
3. PowerShell – Windows Server 2008 R2 includes IIS PowerShell snapin, which is also available on Server Core.

This post describes how to setup and configure IIS on Server Core in Windows Server 2008 R2. Specifically the following tasks are described:

• Using oclist and ocsetup commands
• Basic Installation of IIS
• Installing ASP.NET
• Installing PowerShell and IIS snap-in
• Enabling IIS Remote Management

Continue Reading »

Today IIS team has released the Dynamic IP Restrictions Extension for IIS 7.0 – Beta. The Dynamic IP Restrictions Extension provides IT Professionals and Hosters a configurable module that helps mitigate or block Denial of Service Attacks or cracking of passwords through Brute-force by temporarily blocking Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of HTTP clients who follow a pattern that could be conducive to one of such attacks. This module can be configured such that the analysis and blocking could be done at the Web Server or the Web Site level.

Install the Dynamic IP Restrictions Beta Today!

Microsoft Dynamic IP Restrictions for IIS 7.0 – Beta (x86)

Microsoft Dynamic IP Restrictions for IIS 7.0 – Beta (x64)

If IIS already has IPv4 Address and IP restrictions module enabled then Dynamic IP Restrictions installer will need to un-install the existing module in order to continue the setup process. Note that the existing IPv4 configuration will be preserved while old module is removed and new module is installed. Continue Reading »