IIS Express vs Default IIS that comes with Windows 7
IisIis ExpressIis Problem Overview
I am new to the world of IIS and I wanted to know the following...
I have heard about IIS Express. I run Windows 7 Ultimate and have installed the IIS that comes packaged with Windows 7.
As a developer, is there any major benefit for me if I install IIS Express over the default IIS that comes with Windows 7 for .Net Web projects?
Iis Solutions
Solution 1 - Iis
Here are the differences from http://www.mywindowsclub.com/resources/3302-Key-differences-between-IIS-IIS-Developer.aspx.
If you already have IIS installed - its a better product. IIS express would only be used by people who don't have access to IIS or want something that is lighter than IIS but more like IIS than Cassini.
- Integrated with OS
- IIS 7 ships with the operating system and is tightly integrated to Windows.
- IIS developer express is a separate downloadable tool
- Targetted users
- IIS 7 is for both developers as well as for production purposes.
- IIS developer express can be used only for development purposes and not for production.
- Supported Windows editions
- IIS 7 will work only on Windows Vista and newer editions of Windows. In case of server OS, IIS 7 will work only on Windows 2008.
- IIS developer edition will work even on older version - starting from Windows XP and newer.
- Process model and activation
- In IIS 7, the worker thread is automatically launched and managed by Windows Process Activation Service.
- In case of IIS Express, user has to handle this.
- FTP support
- IIS developer express does not support FTP while IIS 7 supports it.
- WCF support
- IIS Developer express supports only WCF over HTTP.
- IIS 7 supports WCF including over TCP, Named Pipes, and MSMQ.
- Multi developer support
- IIS 7 is a single user application.
- IIS Developer express supports multi developer environment. Configuration files, settings, and Web content are maintained on a per-user basis.
- Visual Studio integration
- All editions and versions of Visual Studio have built-in support for IIS 7.
- Only VS 2010 and future versions will have built-in support for IIS developer express.
- Runtime extensions
- IIS developer has support for URL Rewrite and FastCGI.
- Webmatrix offers support for SEO, database management and Web Deployment. Other extensions that are offered with IIS are not yet tested with IIS Developer express.
- Management Tools
- IIS 7 is managed using the IIS Manager.
- IIS Developer express can be managed using Webmatrix. Also, the express edition has support through system tray.
- Port used by IIS
- The default website comes with IIS 7 listens to port 80.
- The default website part of IIS developer express listens to port 8080 to avoid conflicts with IIS 7 when they are running side by side.
Solution 2 - Iis
From Scott Gu's post on IIS Express:
Why Not IIS > The downside with using the IIS option today, though, is that some > companies don’t allow full web-servers to be installed on developer > machines. IIS also requires administrator account access to setup and > debug projects. Different versions of Windows also support different > versions of IIS. For example, if you are running on Windows XP you > have to use the IIS 5.1 web-server that comes with it – which doesn’t > support all the new features of IIS 7.x. Configuring a web project > within VS to use IIS also requires some extra installation and > configuration steps.
Why IIS Express > It’s lightweight and easy to install (less than 10Mb download and a > super quick install) It does not require an administrator account to > run/debug applications from Visual Studio It enables a full web-server > feature set – including SSL, URL Rewrite, Media Support, and all other > IIS 7.x modules It supports and enables the same extensibility model > and web.config file settings that IIS 7.x support It can be installed > side-by-side with the full IIS web server as well as the ASP.NET > Development Server (they do not conflict at all) It works on Windows > XP and higher operating systems – giving you a full IIS 7.x developer > feature-set on all OS platforms IIS Express (like the ASP.NET > Development Server) can be quickly launched to run a site from a > directory on disk. It does not require any registration/configuration > steps. This makes it really easy to launch and run for development > scenarios.
Solution 3 - Iis
After a couple of hours i found one significant reason to use Express over Local IIS : "Edit and Continue" does not work on local IIS.