How to allow access to internal website in IIS7

1

I developed my first website for a simple internal application using Webmatrix in a Windows 2008 Server R2 machine. I'm able to open the site with a browser in the same machine as it is running, but cannot open it from any other machine in the network. I cannot open the default IIS7 website either.

The error is 401 - Unauthorized: Access is denied due to invalid credentials. You do not have permission to view this directory or page using the credentials that you supplied..

This is what I have done so far, without any changes in the results:

  • Changed the port of my site to 80, and the default to 8080
  • Where it lists all the sites (so far just the default and mine), right-clicked on my site, selected Edit Permissions, selected the Security tab, and verified that Everyone has Allow permissions for everything
  • Where it lists all the sites (so far just the default and mine), right-clicked on my site, selected Edit Permissions, selected the Security tab, and added Domain Users with Read & execute, List folder contents and Read permissions.

BTW, I checked these 3 posts with other fellows having the same issues as me and there are no answers.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/9589759/how-to-allow-users-from-other-computers-to-connect-to-my-iis7-website

Can't access IIS7 from my home network

How does one allow access to networked PCs to see your "localhost" in IIS7 - Windows 7

And yes, I can ping the computer running IIS7, the WWW services are enabled with no restrictions, tried disabling firewall, etc.

Amarundo

Posted 2013-01-14T17:59:10.677

Reputation: 115

Are you running IIS 7.0 or IIS 7.0 Express? WebMatrix installs the latter? – BinaryMisfit – 2013-01-14T18:34:56.987

Diago, how do I know which version I'm running? – Amarundo – 2013-01-14T19:28:14.060

I am not sure how to check it in WebMatrix, but when running the site in WebMatrix is the address localhost or localhost:1234 where 1234 is a port number? It sounds to me like it's the latter which means it won't be accessible from other machines on the network at all. – BinaryMisfit – 2013-01-14T19:33:47.013

it is localhost:1234. But why wouldn't it be accessible using that port number from another machine. And also, what's the point of WebMatrix? Can't you develop anything to be accessible from another computer? Thanks a lot! – Amarundo – 2013-01-14T19:43:53.890

I'm seeing some articles saying precisely that: WebMatrix is meant to produce sites that can only be run from the same PC. Thanks. – Amarundo – 2013-01-14T19:51:50.643

I think you are misunderstanding. It is used to develop websites and then they are publish to an actually hosted web server. In your case you can configure normal IIS on the machine and publish from WebMatrix to make it accessible. See my answer for some important links. – BinaryMisfit – 2013-01-14T19:55:48.950

Answers

0

WebMatrix is a development tool and uses IIS Express not IIS. IIS Express is a smaller version of IIS for use during development of an application and not to be used to host the final usable site. It is by default locked down to only allow the local user of the machine to access the site.

To correctly publish your site to IIS to be accessible by others, you need to configure normal IIS on the machine and publish your site from WebMatrix.

Information on configuring your site can be found at Microsoft Support:
How to set up your first IIS Web site

To publish from WebMatrix the following should help: Publish your Website

I would also suggest you read the following in detail with regards to WebMatrix:

WebMatrix 2

Among other things the following is important (bold by me)

WebMatrix is a free and lightweight web development tool. Create, publish, and maintain your website with ease.

BinaryMisfit

Posted 2013-01-14T17:59:10.677

Reputation: 19 955

Thanks. I will be using that later on. For now, I found this workaround: http://blog.alirobertson.com/post/11139712138/enabling-non-localhost-access-to-webmatrix

– Amarundo – 2013-01-14T20:03:21.883

Asked: 2013-01-14T17:59:10.677

Viewed: 6 814 times

Active: 2013-01-14T19:51:21.877