Windows 2000 Quick Fixes

Manage a web server remotely

If you’ve done much network administration, you probably know the frustration of having to be in front of a server to make configuration changes. A little experience with remote administration and you’ll really come to appreciate the ability to configure a server remotely. Web servers are no exception.

You have a few options for managing a Windows 2000 web server, whether Server or Professional, from a remote location. You can take advantage of the remote administration web site, use the IIS console to connect to other servers on the LAN, or establish a VPN connection and use the IIS console to manage remote servers.

Configure Windows 2000’s HTTP-based administration

Under Windows 2000 Server, IIS offers an administration web site you can use to manage many aspects of the web server including adding and modifying sites, stopping and starting sites, and so on. Windows 2000 Professional does not offer the same capability for administration although it does create an iisadmin virtual directory just as on Server. The IIS console is more useful for server management, but the advantage offered by iisadmin is the ability to manage servers located outside of your network (such as elsewhere on the Internet).

Tip

You can actually connect to two different URLs for the administration site: http://server/iisadmin or http://server:port, where serveris the DNS name or address of the server, and port is the port assigned to the Administration Web Site.

By default iisadmin ...