Wordpress Hosting on Windows Server

Greetings,
I have a weird issue and not sure where to put this under and hence put it under Wordpress.

  1. We have a Wordpress + Woocommerce based website which is currently under Linux Hosting.
  2. We also have a Android based app which is using MS SQL Database and app files are being fetched from a Windows based hosting.

I have ZERO knowledge of how apps are developed and here is what the app developer has been stating
Android apps are developed using Java programming and can be hosted on Windows + need MS SQL database. So is this really required? We had asked them to use PHP + MySQL but they say its a long process to convert from their coding to MySQL / PHP based for the APP.

Hence how easy would it be to shift Wordpress + Woocommerce from a Linux hosting to Windows Hosting. Also it is a Wordpress Multisite (so multiple sites within WP) So is this recommended? Or it would be easier for the APP developers to modify their coding to get data from MySQL Database which is hosted on the Linux Server?

Thanks a lot

Hm I’m not sure how good idea is move WordPress on Windows Server, for many reasons:

First of them are performances - WP is build on PHP, as I know PHP work on Windows but it’s not natively supported platform.

Most of plugins probabbly won’t work.

And you could have issues with SEO, because you can’t use pretty permalinks, there are no .htaccess on Windows server, so no mod_rewrite.

So you won’t get any advantages with moving WP from Linux to Windows, you could only make more job and issues.

@bedakb Ya I mentioned my concerns to the app developer but the app works only on Windows environment. Right now for all products which are listed on WooCommerce they manually update the MS SQL Database on the windows server and the app then displays the products. I suggested to them that it would be easier to simply use the MySQL for the app but they say that their coding is based on MS SQL and migration of code will be a lengthy process. Hence not really sure what to do as I too feel that for WP a Linux based hosting is the best and shifting would only complicate issues.

Sounds like there are many issues and although I have read all in this thread I have not concentrated on fully understanding.

First I will say that WordPress works in Windows (IIS). I have installed it locally in my IIS. There is totally nothing about Linux and PHP that makes PHP special for Linux or Linux special for PHP. Programmers have understood the value of portability for nearly as long as computers have existed. PHP is based on the C language and the C language was initially designed in conjunction with the Unix operating system such that Unix could easily be ported to other computers. So PHP is designed fundamentally to be portable and can work in IIS (Windows) as well as Apache (Linux).

Next you should find programmers familiar with modern technology. For example see Multitier architecture. I would not rely on the Wikipedia to explain everything but it gives an idea. The fundamental idea is that if the data is separate from the business logic then it is easier to convert the data when necessary.

You say you “have a Android based app which is using MS SQL Database” and you say “Android apps” … use “Java programming and can be hosted on Windows”. Yes Android applications use Java but there is something missing from this explanation. It is not clear how your Android applications are using a SQL Server database and it is technically not possible for an Android application to be hosted in Windows, Android and Windows are both operating systems. Actually Android is a UI and an interface to Linux and Linux is the actual operating system, but most people consider Android to be an operating system.

There are many possible solutions. We will need more details. I will try to concentrate on what you have provided before attempting to get further clarification.

I don’t believe this is entirely 100% correct.

There are some differences between running PHP as an Apache module vs. FastCGI.

While perusing the PHP net documentation I have seen some PHP modules that will only work, or will not work, for a Windows server.

But AFAIK in terms of WordPress those modules are not used and for all intent and purpose any differences can be safely ignored.

Unless you have hacked my system, you have no way of knowing what I have installed in my system,.

That sounds like a performance feature. Are you speculating that IIS does not have an equivalent?

Are you aware of anything specific and authoritive saying that WordPress won’t work in IIS? I have seen nothing saying it won’t work and I have seen places that say it does work.

I have thought about this some more. My suggestion is to have the developer(s) document your system. That is critical for many reasons. They should provide an explanation of your system, the type of thing you are trying to provide here at least. If they resist doing that then that makes it more important that you get it. If you want, I will evaluate how useful it is.

Sorry if I didn’t make myself clear.

The quoted part of your post was not meant to imply that the focus was on your setup.

The main point I wanted to make is that depending on how the environment is set up and configured there are some differences.

I have not extensively tested or researched differences, but AFAIK there are strengths and weakness for both Apache and IIS

I did not say WordPress won’t work on IIS, in fact it most assuredly will.

So unless a plugin is using something specific to a particular setup
eg. http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pdo-sqlsrv.php

The PDO_SQLSRV extension is only compatible with PHP running on Windows. For Linux, see ODBC and » Microsoft’s SQL Server ODBC Driver for Linux.

there should be absolutely no problem running WordPress on IIS

As you said, portability is important to WordPress, if it wasn’t WordPress wouldn’t be as ubiquitous as it is.

Thanks all for your responses. Rather than trying to move to a windows server we have asked the developer to change the code and make it PHP compatible as moving seems a very big headache. As the app developer keeps telling that Android app code works only on Windows and needs Windows dependencies to make it work! We have provided him with auto generated apps that can run directly off our current site so we have convinced him to have a second go at his code. Will update based on his feedback. Thanks a lot.

A post was split to a new topic: Any experience with Serverpress or Desktopserver?

It is still not clear what that means since Android definitely does not need Windows.

This topic was automatically closed 91 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.