Setting up a .NET server?

[Jeremy W.]

Okay, becuase of financial reasons (.NET is 300$, Delphi would have cost us 4K) we are switching all our development over to VS.NET, including all our websites (as the need for new development arises).

So, what is involved in setting up a server? Is it JUST win2k + .NET Framework and away you go?

We've got several extra win2k boxes, already have SQL Server 2K installed on our DB server, etc.

I mean, we'll be making the transition in 2 weeks, so it'd be good to know some of the speed bumps

[dhtmlgod]

Basically yeah. You need to sign the "Go-Live" Agreement, which is you can find at the VS.NET website.

[Skunk]

Originally posted by Jeremy W.
Okay, becuase of financial reasons (.NET is 300$, Delphi would have cost us 4K) we are switching all our development over to VS.NET

And PHP / mySQL / PostGreSQL / Perl / Python / Zope / JBoss / Apache / Linux / FreeBSD / Midguard cost $0 and are gauranteed never to increase in price.

Just out of interest, if financial reasons were important did you consider open source alternatives and if you did what were your reasons for going with .NET? I know the advantages of .NET (done a lot of reading recently) but there's nothing wrong with a few case studies...

[Jeremy W.]

We did, but the integratoin with existing software (SQL Server, win2k platform, exchange server, commerce server), the actual experience of the MIS staff, the actual support offered by open source alternatives, etc, generally means that most (if not all) open source alternatives arent' suitable for corporate environments

That doesn't even take into account the learning curve required to go from one OS, IDE, Development Process, etc to another.

Essentially, free isn't free, which is something I've needed to tell one particular team member again and again.

[Skunk]

Understood. It will be interesting to see if the same argument works in a few years time though - the Open Source market seems to be maturing in terms of commercial support (consultancies, companies like Zend / RedHat offering paid support options and so forth) and the move to open XML based standards should make integration less of a problem. Here's hoping anyway

[Jeremy W.]

I know, but even then, in the corporate world, software costs are normally the smallest part of the equation

Put it this way, if there were free products which were really as good as every product we were using, we would switch one day

[Skie]

I use PHP with SQL Server on a Windows box- works great. one line to connect, then it acts almost identical to mySQL. I wrote abstraction layers for mySQL, pgSQL, and SQL server for one of my scripts, and everything was fairly similar and worked out fine.

[Jeremy W.]

... Yes... And I've setup systems which talk across networks, databases, servers and countries seamlessly... That doesn't answer my question though

[Winged Spider]

So, what is involved in setting up a server? Is it JUST win2k + .NET Framework and away you go?

I just did this yesterday for the forth time. Here's what I do.

1. Install Win2k -reboot

2. Install SP2 for Win2k -reboot
( Installed Security Rollups ) not manditory but important

3. Install IE6.0 -reboot
Windows Update

4. Install Data Access Components 2.7 -reboot
http://www.microsoft.com/data

5. Install .NET SDK
http://msdn.microsoft.com/downloads/...mpositedoc.xml

6. Install .NET SP1
http://msdn.microsoft.com/netframewo...p1/default.asp

Hope this helps. If you already have a 2k server running swapping in .NET is easy, you don't even have to reboot 90% of the time.

[Jeremy W.]

Awesome, that helps so much! Thanx!