Enable Basic authentication on RDWeb webclient

Question

Use case: I'm evaluating options for implementing RDWeb webclient behind a loadbalancer that handles authentication and achieve the passing of credentials to the RDWeb webclient. On "Default Website\RDWeb\Pages" I can do this using "Basic Authentication" simply by changing the IIS Authentication.

Issue: It seems that "Default Website\RDWeb\webclient" allows to use "Windows Authentication" by changing "C:\Windows\Web\RDWeb\Pages\web.config", but "Basic Authentication" is not supported. (or documented?) I was unable to make Basic Authentication work.

Could basic auth be made to work?

Answer 1

Unfortunately, the authentication mode of web.config does not support Basic authentication.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.web.configuration.authenticationmode?view=netframework-4.8.1

Forms	3	Specifies ASP.NET Forms-based authentication as the authentication mode.
None	0	Specifies no authentication.
Passport	2	Specifies Microsoft Passport as the authentication mode.
Windows	1	Specifies Windows as the authentication mode. This mode applies when using the Internet Information Services (IIS) authentication methods Basic, Digest, Integrated Windows (NTLM/Kerberos), or certificates.