Fear and Loathing in IIS

Posted 3 years ago

— filed under

So, yesterday I had a lull at work and I took it upon myself to update our much-neglected internal knowledgebase (Drupal, naturally). It's an odd configuration -- PHP/MySQL running on IIS alongside a python timesheet program and an ASP application -- but it was working until a server crash a few months ago.

What I thought would be a quick job turned into eight hours of pain thanks to what I eventually realized was an obscure bug in IIS 4.0 and higher. If you're ever trying to install Drupal on IIS, save yourself the pain and do not run PHP in CGI mode. I posted a handbook entry on Drupal.org to share the pain. In a nutshell, IIS plus PHP in CGI mode means that server redirects on a web app's login page trash the session data. Converting to ISAPI mode solves it. After getting that sorted out, things seem to be humming along nicely. Hooray!

now to be fair

Submitted by sepeck (not verified) on March 31, 2006 - 11:14am.

All the php install guides for IIS say you should run in ISAPI mode anyway. Now we know why. :)

Depends...

Submitted by Admin on March 31, 2006 - 12:54pm.

I've read advice that goes both ways. A number of install guides say that ISAPI mode is 'buggy' and shouldn't be used on production servers. The age of a number of the guides makes deciding what information is out of date tricky.

I'm certainly an ISAPI believer, now, though. ;)

Thanks a lot

Submitted by Heine (not verified) on March 31, 2006 - 12:04pm.

Such obscure bugs are horrible; thank you for sharing!

Not always?

Submitted by Drew (not verified) on January 30, 2007 - 1:30pm.

I've had this problem in the past myself, but just did a fresh install of Drupal 4.7.6 using PHP 5.01 running in CGI mode on IIS 6... and it worked
I posted a comment to the handbook thread with a few more details:
[[http://drupal.org/node/56654#comment-194801]]

.... don't know what to make of it... but it's working so far. I'll be updating the Drupal thread with any updates...

problem

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on August 9, 2007 - 11:45am.

I am running IIS 5 and PHP with ISAPI and I am getting the same 'redirect' problem. I've put in a brand new drupal 5.2 install and once I set up my admin user I get access denied. When I log in I come back to the home screen with an access denied error, just as you describe above. I did a phpinfo and it is running ISAPI.

Any ideas on what I coule be doing wrong.

Post new comment

Miniblog

Was skeptical about #drupal 7's new code registry, but by golly it DOES make maintaining my big modules easier. — 5 hours ago
Talking to @knaddison and brainstorming for Token 2.0. http://is.gd/1lKpd — 6 hours ago
This July 4th, only Slate has the courage to say, 'Fireworks suck.' Its absurd contrarian compulsion never disappoints. http://is.gd/1lIK0 — 7 hours ago
Thanks a LOT, Apple. I just bought my macbook pro and it's already obsolete? http://bit.ly/dQVud (via @amystephen) — 8 hours ago
It's really kind of staggering how much work it is to make a generic wrapper around other website thumbnailing services. — 9 hours ago

Comments

Linkblog

The Vietnam of Computer Science — Building an ORM system is a quagmire which starts well, gets more complicated as time passes, and before long entraps its users in a commitment that has no clear demarcation point, no clear win conditions, and no clear exit strategy.
mk-query-digest — Parses logs and more. Analyze, transform, filter, review and report on queries. Nice tool for digging deeper when mysql reports something as "slow"...
Multiple 3D Cubes using CSS — Holy wow. CSS3 is pretty hot.
PublicEye — Political Research Associates, a group that investigates and explains various political groups and movements.
Games of Cthulhu — A simple flash based card game based on the works of HP Lovecraft.
Letter of Refusal — In which Jourdon Anderson, an ex-Tennessee slave, declines his former master's invitation to return as a laborer on his plantation.
activity streams — an extension to the Atom feed format to express what people are doing around web
Max Barry: Memory blockers for pediatric medicine — Author Max Barry recounts the story of his daughter's trip to the hospital for a broken arm, where she was given memory blockers rather than painkillers. Um. Yay?
Variable Grid System — Roll your own 960-esque grid system, with widths and gutters calculated for you.
FreakAngels — Twelve kids from Whitechapel. Seven years ago, they ended the world: now they're trying to make good. Stellar graphic novel published for free on the web.