Working on a tutorial and cannot find the Web Site Administration Tool.

AlphaCr8tive 1

Hello,

I am working on a login tutorial and cannot find the Web Site Administration Tool to use to configure asp.net. Here is a link to the tutorial:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/aspnet/yh26yfzy(v=vs.100)

I vaguely remember in visual studio 2008 there was a Web Site Administration Tool that you could use to configure your website. Cannot find it in VS 2022.

I look forward to hearing from you. Thank you.

Best Regards

5 answers

Albert Kallal 5,331 Reputation points

2023-09-03T13:30:02.1866667+00:00
To manage users? Well, often one just creates a simple edit screen.

And in some cases, I wanted to add me as some "super user", then I just go edit the "user in roles" table directly from SQL studio.

As noted, you can build a page easy in less then 1 hour of your time. It really depends on what you need. You should see some tables like this:

Now, in above, the contact name table is not standard. However, the other 4 tables are what was in those days created by the "tool" when creating such sites. So, you find those above tables in the database.

As for changing the connection?

You should find in web config both the "application" conneciton string (what database to use for the applicaiton). You should also find a conneciton string for the authentication (logons).

It looks like this:

<add name="FBAConnectionString" connectionString="server=.\SQLEXPRESS;Initial Catalog=AxisMIS;Persist Security Info=True;User ID=xxxxxx;Password=xxxxx;APP=WebPortal;WSID=WebPortal" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />

So, it could be called anything, but you find above in the conneciton strings area.

Then further down, the above "name" will be used to tell the web site WHERE and what database to use for logons.

It will be like this:

<membership defaultProvider="MySqlprovider"> <providers> <clear/> <add name="MySqlProvider" type="ajaxsetuptest1.MySqlprovider" connectionStringName="FBAConnectionString" enablePasswordRetrieval="true" enablePasswordReset="true" minRequiredPasswordLength="3" writeExceptionsToEventLog="false"/> </providers> </membership> <roleManager enabled="true" defaultProvider="MyRoleProvider"> <providers> <clear/> <add connectionStringName="FBAConnectionString" name="MyRoleProvider" type="ajaxsetuptest1.MyRoleProvider"/> </providers> </roleManager>

So, both role, and membership provider should point to and use that connection string you defined.

Of course at publish time, you no doubt find the correct "production" strings in web.release.config. In most case, web.release.config will have "transforms" that overwrite (change) the test/debug strings you likely have in web.config for development.
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xprogrammerx 20 Reputation points

2023-10-01T01:31:15.6733333+00:00

First thank you for your answer,

To point the WSAT to my production database , i still have questions , just exactly which web config should i edit ,

notice there are two, one in my application folder,and the second in the WSAT folder ASP.NETWebAdminFiles.

Note also that If i change the connection string named LocalSqlServer located in the C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319\Config\machinf.config

(which is not practical) this seems to work perfectly and point at my production database, so obviously it uses that connection string named LocalSqlServer,

i tried removing it and adding it in the ASP.NETWebAdminFiles\web.config but it didn't work .

Thank you for your help.

Albert Kallal 5,331 Reputation points

2023-10-01T02:17:11.5533333+00:00

The web config for connections is going to be in the root of your application. You NOT be changing anything else. So, no, not machine config. You should ONLY have to touch/see/look at and modify the web.config in the root of hte project.

Keep in mind that it is common to have multiple web.config files. Often EACH sub folder of a given project will have it's own web.config file. They are used to "secure" the individual folder. Hence, it stands to reason that most sites will "group" their web pages by a folder based on security's roles. So, for site admin pages, we palace all such pages in say a folder called SiteAdmin, and along with a web.config file to secure that folder and any and all web pages inside to say a given security role.

So, you might have say this:

So, in above, note how each of the folders have web.configs. Thus, security settings are "obvisouly" in use in the above example. Thus, if we were to open up the web.config file say in SiteAdmin folder: This one:

In that web.config, we would see/find this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <configuration> <system.web> <authorization> <allow roles="SiteAdmin" /> <deny users="*" /> </authorization> </system.web> </configuration>

So, only users that are members of the security's role "SiteAdmin" can use ANY page inside of that sub Folder SiteAdmin. If any user attempts to hit/use a web page in that sub folder, they will be automatic punted out and sent to the logon page.

So, rather common to see/have many web.config's in a given application. You often find one in each sub folder. however, opening them up, you ONLY will find security settings - not "general" things like connection strings.

i tried removing it and adding it in the ASP.NETWebAdminFiles\web.config but it didn't work .

As above shows, if the connection string does not exist in the web.config file, then that's almost FOR SURE the wrong place!

There is ONLY ONE practical spot/place you should EVER find connection and setup information for that given site. That location is in the root folder's web.config.

That ONE place is in the root of the site, and it will look like this:

So, you not see/find/use/bother with ANY other web.config as a general rule then the one in the root of the project as shown above.

And if you open the "wrong" .config file, you not see nor find the connection's anyway.

So, in above, I have web.config (which is the debug one), and then I have the release one (web.release.config.

I also have in above the web.debug.config, and in MOST cases you find people don't use that config. (so the web.debug.config will in most cases be "empty" as it would be used to add markup that ONLY exists in debug mode.

This means that the MOST important .config is the web.config. That is ALSO what you will use DURING debug/development on your computer.

So, n MOST cases that one big long complex "messy" web.config file is used for both development, and for production deployment.

The only difference (in most cases) would be at publish time, that the connection strings are to be used, and thus the web.release.config will have some xml "xlt" transforms to modify the existing web.config, and in most cases ONLY modify the connection strings. (and maybe the debug="true" setting to now be debug="false".

So, there should not be "much" in the web.release.config xml file, but only a few things.

Everything else in near 99% of cases will thus be the same for debug and production sites, and only that of the database connection strings having been changed.

So, the only 2 configs you care about are the above 2 in that screen cap. They are in the root folder - don't touch anything else!!! So, 2 files:

Web.Config

And then

Web.Release.config.

BOTH of these files will reside in the root of the site.....

Machine configs will be on a per server bases, and will be setup using the IIS control panel on the server.
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Bruce (SqlWork.com) 68,236 Reputation points

2023-10-01T16:57:07.2133333+00:00

If you still have the installer in your framework folder, you manually install the site. See

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/32194465/where-is-web-site-administration-on-visual-studio-2015
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xprogrammerx 20 Reputation points

2023-10-03T09:09:21.6066667+00:00

I use IIS Express for now,so i can't install it i think, so i just run it using the following command :

iisexpress.exe /path:C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\ASP.NETWebAdminFiles /vpath:"/ASP.NETWebAdminFiles" /port:8082 /clr:4.0 /ntlm

And access it via the following url :

http://localhost:8082/asp.netwebadminfiles/default.aspx?applicationPhysicalPath=C:\[YOUR SITE PATH HERE]&applicationUrl=/

So running the website is not the problem now, but pointing it to my database is the problem , i use this connection string in the WSAT web.config ( C:\Windows......\ASP.NETWebAdminFiles\web.config ):

<connectionStrings> <remove name="LocalSqlServer" /> <add name="LocalSqlServer" connectionString="Server=.\---------;Database=-------;User Id=--;Password=-----------;" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/> </connectionStrings>

Bruce (SqlWork.com) 68,236 Reputation points

2023-10-04T22:15:34.76+00:00

the

applicationPhysicalPath=C:[YOUR SITE PATH HERE]

is how it finds your application web.config and gets the connection string. should be in membership providers section.
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Lan Huang-MSFT 29,916 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2022-06-29T06:36:57.707+00:00

Hi @AlphaCr8tive ,
This document is currently out of date and the Site Administration Tool has been removed.
https://developercommunity.visualstudio.com/t/cannot-find-aspnet-configuration-button-in-visual/335394
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/aspnet/yy40ytx0(v=vs.100)

Maybe you can look at ASP.NET Identity instead, which outlines the old ASP.NET membership and the new ASP.NET identity.
Identity should be easier to integrate into your application.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/aspnet/identity/overview
Best regards,
Lan Huang

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xprogrammerx 20 Reputation points

2023-09-01T09:44:58.25+00:00

Hello everyone,

I am having the same issue here.

I was wandering what we can do about old projects using the Membership API , i myself will update to Identity but

still sometimes we are stuck with old projects.

So as of now , what is the proper way to manage the aspnet database created by the aspnet_regsql.exe command line tool?

Another important question i have is how to change the connection string for the WSAT so that it points to my production database ,

i can't seem to identify the connection string in the web.config, so all other tabs works fine but the security Tab does not work.

Thank you for your help.
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xprogrammerx 20 Reputation points

2023-10-05T15:36:33.0566667+00:00

Finally , i decided to not work with WSAT , i will just use the Membership and Role Manager API to create web pages to manage my security database, i will have to create a registration page anyway for users , and after a while i can create my own WSAT .

I got some informations and now i understand how the aspnet security database is structured.

Your help was much appreciated though, thank you.
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Working on a tutorial and cannot find the Web Site Administration Tool.

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