Friday 26 September 2008

Windows Home Server & IIS Reinstallation

I've been using windows home server as a very cheap way to get a hold of windows server 2003 for one of my production machines, the other day I ran into a Hosting issue with the WCF .svc files not being recognised in IIS 6.0 - The solution? reinstalling IIS.

But this had it's own problems... Windows Home Server needs IIS and had some half dozen virtual directories installed as virtual directories.  All with special privileges and who knows what.

I was prepared to do away with the backup facilities, but I wanted to expose my web-site to the world and to be honest.... I wouldn't have a clue how to setup the router!  WHS (Windows home server) has a nifty facility to do this for you... Only it needs to be functioning correctly in order to do it.

So... back to my original problem... how do I fix WHS after a IIS reinstall?  A quick scan around the web brought little encouragement... Lots of advice that it is easier to reinstall the OS! (What the!)  There was also hints that there is a WHS folder in the main installation drive.

A quick glance and I remembered these all being run during the original installation routine.  They all ran after the principal windows server 2003 was installed. 

I didn't exactly write down which ones I installed. But I believe that I ran at least the following:c:\WHS file contents

  • umrabase.exe
  • umrahome.exe
  • umraremote.exe

So problem solved.

And no OS reinstall required!

3 comments:

mike said...

I am concerned how you did this, do you have any detailed steps

mike said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Unknown said...

It was in 2008 so I can't be any clearer than the post says.

Have you tried running the suggested executables?