Sunday, June 21, 2009

Common ASP.NET problems related to IIS

The page cannot be found - return 404 for ASP.NET pages
OK button is grayed out while adding an IIS file mapping
Missing ASP.NET tab on IIS Manager
Parser Error: Could not load type

The page cannot be found - return 404 for ASP.NET pages

Make sure IIS is accepting the correct ASP.NET version. ASP.NET tab on IIS
On Windows 2003, you also need to ensure ASP.NET version is set to Allow for that ASP.NET version in Web Service Extensions. If you don't see ASP.NET extension, follow "Missing ASP.NET tab on IIS Manager" to install and enable it. After that, if you're running into the following error, your ASP.NET page probably has to run some shell command that requires additional permission.
   The compiler failed with error code 128.
   ...
   c:\windows\system32\inetsrv> "C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5\csc.exe" ...
In this case, go to Administrative Tools and select Services:
  • In the Services pane, locate World Wide Web Publishing Service.
  • Right-click World Wide Web Publishing Service, and then click Properties.
  • Click the Log On tab.
  • Click to clear the Allow service to interact with desktop checkbox.
  • Click OK.
Be sure to start the IIS and kill the browser before running the application again.

OK button is grayed out while adding an IIS file mapping

It is a small bug on IIS 5.1 with Windows XP.

To work around this:

After selecting the executable via the Browse... button, click on the textbox itself and the path will then be fully expanded. It in turn enables the OK button. [ref]



Missing ASP.NET tab on IIS Manager

Please ensure you have installed .NET framework first. For ASP.NET 2.0 or later, at the command prompt, do the following to install and enable ASP.NET on IIS:

%WinDir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_regiis -i -enable


Parser Error: Could not load type

You may experience the following error on IIS after you've published your ASP.NET application. But everything works fine in the Visual Studio. For example,

Parser Error Message: Could not load type 'SysAdmin.RunBatch'.

  • Check the Application Settings of your Web site or virtual directory, and then make sure there is Application name for it.
    • On IIS, right click the Web site or virtual directory, and then select Properties.
    • At Home Directory of Directory tab, click Create button to create the Application Name if it doesn't exist.
    • Execute Permissions must be at least set to Scripts only.
    • Click Apply and then OK to exit.
  • Check and ensure that the associated bin directory is resided with your aspx pages and Web.config. It is similar to the directory structure when you developed your application.