Share via

Lesson 3: Changing Properties of the IIS Metabase

  • Article

The following table compares the different ways you can change the properties of the IIS metabase.

Tool Process Advantages Disadvantages
IIS Manager Open the property sheets for a service, site, or virtual directory and change values. Changes take place immediately without a need to stop and start the server. IIS Manager informs you if the a new value is invalid. Using IIS Manager is tedious when frequently managing multiple machines.
Metabase configuration file In Notepad, open the metabase configuration file from its working location, systemroot\System32\Inetsrv\MetaBase.xml, and make changes. Save the file.
A change notification is sent to the IIS server.		 You can change multiple properties or create new nodes in one instance without having to open and close multiple property sheets. If a value is invalid, there is no warning. It is too easy to make a mistake. One typing mistake can bring down your entire server. Sometimes it is necessary to stop and start the server before the changes take place.
Using WMI programmatically Write an ASP page, a command-line script, or compile a program that uses WMI to access the metabase configuration file. Changes take place immediately without needing to stop and start the server.
  • Programmatic administration is easy. You can change one property, or multiple properties on multiple machines across a network, securely.
  • Using the WMI Query Language, you can query an abnormally large server for one specific property to find the site or virtual directory where it is set.
  • One connection to WMI gives you access to all Windows providers.
 It can take a while to learn how to use WMI. In many cases, ADSI exhibits better performance than WMI.
Using ADSI programmatically Write an ASP page or a command-line script; or compile a program that uses ADSI to access the metabase configuration file. Changes take place immediately without a need to stop and start the server. Programmatic administration is fast. You can change one property, or multiple properties on multiple machines across a network. It can take a while to learn how to use each individual ADSI provider.
CIM Studio
  1. Connect to the MicrosoftIISv2 namespace with the Enable all privileges check box selected.
  2. Browse to a CIM_Setting element, and click Instances .
  3. Scroll to the property you want to change in the right frame, click the box containing the current data and change it.
  4. You can create sites and virtual directories by clicking New Instance . Changes take place immediately.
 Everything is within your view. The schema, the instances, and all properties are visible without having to click a different tab in a property sheet. Using CIM Studio is tedious when frequently managing multiple machines.

In the next module, we begin to write administration scripts using all the resources already discussed.