Default Documents can not include Query Strings
The Issue
On our older server, we had many domains feeding into the same web application, yet each domain would set certain variables through the query strings of the default document of the site.
For instance, a domain "myExample.com" a default page "DefaultPage.aspx?e=29" would set all the variables necessary for portal #29.
With IIS7, we no longer have this luxury, and must only feed in a single filename, i.e. "DefaultPage.aspx"
Issues for Multiple Websites with the Same Home Directory
One of my first thoughts was, ugh, am I really going to have to create a seperate landing page for EVERY domain linking into the site? As you'll read in the work-around, no. That's not the best way to do it. And as it turns out, it's not even possible. For every Home Directory you route to in IIS7, you have to use the same landing page for all websites pointing to that folder. So, if I have myExampleA.com and myExampleB.com both pointing to c:\inetpub\wwwroot\myExamples\ and I define myExampleA.com's default document to be WelcomeToA.aspx, then myExampleB.com will inherit the same default document. They have to be the same. Another big change for default documents when migrating from IIS6 to IIS7.
The Solution
I've noted several people using URL Rewrites to solve this, but with an application as large as ours, it would take days to test everything to ensure implementing an application wide URL Rewrite wouldn't cause any problems elsewhere.
But, since every domain sets a different set of variables, I was able to find a simple solution.
I feed every domain into the same default document, i.e. RerouterPage.aspx that then looks at the domain of the request, compares it to my database to determine the portal ID (the ?e=##) of the request and then set all the variables accordingly. Afterwards it redirects the user to the correct landing page.
Here's a little sample of what my code looked like for the RerouterPage.aspx
Public Sub Form_Load() Handles Me.Load
If Session("portal") Is Nothing Then
If Request("e") = "" Then
Session("portal") = PullPortalBasedOnDomain()
Else
If IsNumeric(Request("e")) Then
Session("portal") = New Portal(Request("e"))
Else
Response.Redirect("~/NoPortal.aspx")
End If
End If
End If
If CType(Session("portal"), Portal).PortalID = 0 Then
Response.Redirect("~/NoPortal.aspx")
End If
Response.Redirect("~/" & CType(Session("portal"), Portal).LandingPage)
End Sub
Private Function PullPortalBasedOnDomain() As Portal
Dim thisDomain As String = "http://" & Request.ServerVariables("SERVER_NAME").ToString
thisDomain = thisDomain.Replace("www.", "")
Return Portal.GetPortalBasedOnDomain(thisDomain)
End Function
IIS7 Blocks Images in Bin Folders
The Issue
I got into kind of a stupid habit left over from when I used to develop in PHP, but when I make an images folder, I usually divide my images up into several different subfolders related to their purpose and for all general images, I just toss them into a subfolder named "bin". You can probably guess where this is going. IIS7 blocks view access to all folders in your solution named bin. Unfortunately, the images/bin/ folder is referenced throughout the entire site and would be a monsterous task to go through and replace.
The Solution
Luckily, through some research I found this work around that seems to work great:
</system.webServer>
<location path="images/bin">
<system.webServer>
<security>
<requestFiltering>
<hiddenSegments>
<remove segment="bin" />
</hiddenSegments>
</requestFiltering>
</security>
</system.webServer>
</location>
Now the bin subfolder within the images folder has view access.
