I want to use ASP.Net MVC. My server is Win 2003 and it uses IIS 6, will all this work together?

Question

ASP.Net MVC is finally available as version 1. I have been waiting for an official release before I try to start using it. At the moment I have a dedicated web server which I have complete access to via remote desktop. It is running Win 2003 Server with IIS6 (I think it is IIS6, they don't print the version in the Help -> About but a bit of research says that IIS6 is the standard on Win 2003 Server) and .Net 2.0.

Obviously I will need to upgrade the framework to .Net 3.0. But after that, should everything else work? I thought I saw somewhere that .Net 3.0 insists on IIS7. If that is true is IIS7 compatible with Windows 2003 Server?

Also any literature you can point me to or any tips on making the upgrade/transition?

EDIT: Sorry too excited guys. Yes I meant .Net 3.5. :D

EDIT: LAST QUESTION: Someone mentioned a routing problem. I remember reading that somewhere but can't quite remember. My project relies heavily on a good Google Ranking and I don't want to sacrifice page rank because of a routing problem. Will I still be able to get around it with IIS6? Thanks again. :D

Answer 1

You'll need .NET Framework 3.5, not 3.0. Better be SP1. There'll be no problems with that setup. Make sure your read http://haacked.com/archive/2008/11/26/asp.net-mvc-on-iis-6-walkthrough.aspx

By the way, IIS7 cannot be installed on Windows Server 2003. ASP.NET MVC and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 do not rely on any IIS7 specific features.

Answer 2

Yes, it's possible to run an ASP.Net MVC site on Windows 2003 server running IIS 6.0, though there's a little more configuration to do in IIS 6.0 because of the routing. Oh, and you'll need .Net Framework 3.5 SP1.

The documentation and steps you'll need to take are on the ASP.Net MVC deployment page :o)

Answer 3

As per the link mentioned by Andrew (above), you have two choices with IIS6:

1. Add the mvc prefix to the routes (eg. {controller}.mvc/{action}/{id} )
2. Use the wildcard mapping (only IIS6/Win2k3 and not win XP/iis 5.1)

The drawback of number 2 is that it can cause performance problems if you have a lot of traffic. However, there is workaround to this that involves creating a separate subdirectory for static files like gifs/jpegs/scripts etc. See Steve Sanderson’s blog post for details