I understand that the WebRole module inside my Web Role web app project runs inside WAIISHost.exe and the rest of the app runs inside W3WP.EXE. Therefore web.config settings cannot be read from the WebRole app domain.
This can be solved by creating a special "waiishost.exe.config" in the web project file and set the "Copy to Output Directory" property to "Copy Always".
That's fine. However, now, I have config settings in ServiceConfiguration AND web.config AND "waiishost.exe.config". This is only a minor but annoying issue though. The biggest problem is that when I publish my Azure project, ServiceConfiguration and web.config get automatically transformed into the production values whereas waiishost.exe.config does not get transformed, so I end up with development config going into the production environment. (the production env is not live yet, so not a major issue yet)
Can anyone think of any ideas as to how I can also have the Publish process transform waiishost.exe.config? Maybe I could run some kind of startup process which could simply copy and rename the web.config file to be waiishost.exe.config before waiishost.exe starts.
BTW, I cannot simply move config to the ServiceConfiguration file as I have whole config sections and connection strings which are used by third party components, like the ServiceBusConfiguration section.
Many thanks
Yes, there is.
A little manual, but is "one-time-setup" per project. Check out this and that blog posts I've made a while ago (even before you could have ServiceConfiguration files). These blog posts will give you a great idea on how to achieve your desire.
Related
The question is a follow up to this one: Generate Web.Debug config which could be debugged](Generate Web.Debug.config which could be debugged)
I have defined a transformation for web.debug.config. During compilation I see the following:
Transformed Web.config using C:\data\Main\WebRole\Web.Debug.config into
C:\data\Main\obj\obj\x64\Debug\WebRole.csproj\TransformWebConfig\ [...]
transformed\Web.config.
Checked Web.config in the specified location - it is correct (transformation succeeded)
But when I start the service in the azure emulator I get an alert that
Why does it happen? Looks that incorrect web.config is taken. Where should I specify the location of correct (transformed) file?
The key thing to realise with web.config Transforms (and is mentioned in the answer to your linked question) is that they are only part of the story.
When you build your sources, the transformed web.config file is built into the /obj/ folder, ready for deployment.
It is only the act of deploying your solution somewhere that puts the transformed config file into use - as noted in the docs:
When you deploy the Web application by using the selected build configuration and by using either a deployment package or one-click publish, the Web.config file is transformed according to your specifications.
How are you running the application after you build it? You need to publish or deploy it using one of the built in mechanisms that support web transforms to see those changes on your site.
If you are running the emulator against the original source files, they won't see the transformed web.config file - which is why typically the debug build doesn't have any transforms and you then turn off debugging with your Release build which is then deployed to production.
As you're trying to test this in the emulator you should be able to do the following:
In the Solution Explorer, ensure you've selected a file within the project that runs in the emulator.
From the Build menu, select "Publish [Project Name".
In the Publish Wizard, create a new "Profile" using the "Custom" publish target.
In the "Connection" pane select "File System" as the publish method, and give it a suitable target location.
In the "Settings" pane choose the appropriate configuration (in your case probably "Debug"), and set any other options that you'd like.
Then press "Publish", and the project should be built, and then deployed to the new file location.
You should then be able to start the emulator from this newly published location, which will be using your transformed web.config.
I have found this solution and it works perfectly
https://translate.google.co.il/translate?hl=en&sl=de&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sascha-dittmann.de%2Fpost%2FWebConfig-Transformation-im-Windows-Azure-Compute-Emulator.aspx&anno=2
Background:
I have an ASP.NET web app configured for federation with AD FS. I'm using VS 2012, and have TFS for source control, builds and deployments.
We're currently deploying by copying the built files from the build server (TFS) to the alpha environment. From there we would copy from alpha to beta, then from beta to production. So there is not a unique build for each environment. The way we're handling environment-specific settings right now is there is one config file that has all the settings for each environment Let's call this EnvironmentSpecificSettings.config (I'll refer to it below). There is a static file on each server that indicates which environment the server should be in, and so when that config file is read in, the matching settings can be applied.
The problem:
The ADFS configuration is handled in the web.config. There are a few things that are specific to the environment. How might I handle this within my current deployment paradigm? I had a couple of ideas:
include a file reference in the web.config that reads in a static environment-specific file that would not be part of the deployment.
Try to pull something off in Application_Start that would read in settings from EnvironmentSpecificSettings.config (mentioned above) and alter the web.config.
Try to tweak the configuration of the WSFederationAuthenticationModule at runtime
the first idea (#1) is less than optimal because it requires files hanging around outside of source control and outside of deployments, however it should work easily enough. Next, #2 I kinda think isn't possible. I'm not sure you can change your web.config like I am hoping, but maybe? Finally, #3 Is only reasonable because I'm in a special situation where I'm not doing regular passive authentication, instead I'm manually redirecting to adfs, so I have a chance to change settings, such as injecting the whr parameter to avoid HRD. So, it might be possible, however, I'm not sure how or if you can change some of these values on the fly such as thumbprint, or wsFederation issuer or realm.
Does anyone have any better ideas or experience in handling environment-specific settings without doing the visual studio web deploys with transforms?
I'm struggling to get web.config transformations working with automated builds.
We have a reasonably large solution, containing one ASP.NET web application and eight class libraries. We have three developers working on the project and, up to now, each has "published" the solution to a local folder then used file copy to deploy to a test server. I'm trying to put an automated build/deploy solution in place using TFS 2010.
I created a build definition and added a call to msdeploy.exe in the build process template, to get the application deployed to the test server. So far, so good!
I then tried to implement web.config transforms and I just can't get them to work. If I build and publish locally on my PC, the "publish" folder has the correct, transformed web.config file.
Using team build, the transformation just does not happen, and I just have the base web.config file.
I tried adding a post-build step in the web application's project file, as others have suggested, similar to:
<target name="AfterBuild">
<TransformXml Source="Web.generic.config"
Transform="$(ProjectConfigTransformFileName)"
Destination="Web.Config" />
</target>
but this fails beacuse the source web.config file has an "applicationSettings" section. I get the error
Could not find schema information for the element 'applicationSettings'.
I've seen suggstions around adding arguments to the MSBuild task in the build definition like
/t:TransformWebConfig /p:Configuration=Debug
But this falls over when the class library projects are built, presumably because they don't have a web.config file.
Any ideas? Like others, I thought this would "just work", but apparently not. This is the last part I need to get working and it's driving me mad. I'm not an msbuild expert, so plain and simple please!
Thanks in advance.
Doug
I just went through this. Our build was a bit more complicated in that we have 8 class libraries and 9 web applications in one solution. But the flow is the same.
First off get rid of your after build target. You won't need that.
You need to use the MSDeployPublish service. This will require that it be installed and configured properly on the destination server. Check the following links for info on this part:
Note that the server in question MUST be configured properly with the correct user rights. The following sites helped me get that properly set up.
http://william.jerla.me/post/2010/03/20/Configuring-MSDeploy-in-IIS-7.aspx
http://vishaljoshi.blogspot.com/2010/11/team-build-web-deployment-web-deploy-vs.html
How can I get TFS2010 to run MSDEPLOY for me through MSBUILD?
The next part requires that your build definition have the correct MSBuild parameters set up to do the publish. Those parameters are entered in the Process > 3.Advanced > MS Build Arguments line of the build definition. Here's a hint:
(don't change the following for any reason)
/p:DeployOnBuild=True
/p:DeployTarget=MsDeployPublish
/p:CreatePackageOnPublish=False
/p:MSDeployPublishMethod=WMSVC
/p:SkipExtraFilesOnServer=True
/p:AllowUntrustedCertificate=True
(These control where it's going)
/p:MSDeployServiceUrl="https://testserver.domain:8172/msdeploy.axd"
/p:UserName=testserver\buildaccount
/p:Password=buildacctpassword
/p:DeployIisAppPath="MyApp - TESTING"
Obviously the user will have to be configured in IIS on the target server to be allowed access to that axd (see previous links). And the IisAppPath is the name of the website on the target server.
You won't have to do anything special for the config transformations as the build itself will take care of that for you. Just have the correct setting in the line at Process > 1. Required > Items to Build > Configurations To Build.
Instead of trying to do the deploy by adding tasks myself into the build process template, I followed advice in Vishal Joshi's blog post here.
Now the entire project is built and deployed and the web.config transformations work also. Brilliant!
I now have another problem to solve! The web application references web services and the build process results in an XmlSerializers dll. However, although this is built OK, it does not get deployed to the web host. I think this needs a new post!
Doug
Is it possible to configure an IIS site to read ASP.Net settings from a site OTHER than web.config?
We'd like to have three config files in our codebase -- web-dev.config, web-test.config, and web-prod.config. Each IIS instance would be configured to read from their specific file. This way we have version control them all next to each other (and one-click deploy the entire site) but know that each IIS instance will read the settings specific to itself.
I've found in IIS where it shows where the web.config is, but I can't see how to change the location.
I use the configSource property to specify an external config file for sections that need different values for dev and production.
<connectionStrings configSource="Config\ConnDev.config"/>
Then you only have to change one setting (manually or with a tool) to switch from Dev to Production configs.
The best solution right now is to use different configs for development and production. This however will change with .net 4 and VS 2010 which they have added Web.Debug.config, Web.Release.config, Web.Staging.config and Web.Testing.config which will then publish the config you need in relation to the environment.
At my company we just have our deployment tool set to copy the appropriate file to web.config depending on what kind of deployment we're doing.
I believe it has to be named web.config.
You are facing a common problem.
One solution that I have used that worked really well in a large organization was to set environment variables on the web servers. Such as DEV, QA, UAT, PROD. Then, in code, you can query the environment variable to see which machine you are on, and then choose the values of appSettings accordingly. For example, you could have a database connection string named DEVconnection, and another named UATconnection. If your code determines from the environment variable that you are on UAT, then it would use UATconnection.
This does assume that you have the ability to set environment variables on the web server. In this instance, the admins running the servers were the ones who suggested this solution.
What was sweet about this was that there was ever only one version of web.config.
I do not think we can make web.config declaratively so that we can specify different config file. One thing you can do you can split your configuration file and set for different environments.
Please go through this article
http://jetmathew.wordpress.com/2011/02/07/split-web-config-for-different-environment/
cheers
How can one specify the connection string in a config file of a class library and later modify this when used in a ASP.NET Web Application?
The Class library is a data access layer that has a Dataset connecting to a database based on a connection string specified in a config file (Settings.settings/app.config).
This class library is used in a web application where user inputs data and is written to the database using the DAL classes & methods exposed in the class library.
Now, I want to migrate this application from development environment to testing environment and later to production. The problem I'm facing is that after migrating to testing, the app in testing still connects to development database. I've changed the connection string mentioned in <class library>.dll.config file but this seems to have no impact.
Can someone explain the right way to achieve this? Thanks in advance for any help. Cheers.
With the .config files the name has to match the main executing assembly. For example I had a situation like yours, I needed a class library to have its settings in a .dll.config file. While it was able to reference it the actual application would not be able to read the config file because it was expecting .exe.config. Renaming the .dll.config to .exe.config fixed the problem.
In your case migrating your connection strings from .dll.config to web.config should fix your problem!
Good luck!
Joshua is partly right ... For posterity I would like to add a bit more to this answer as I have delt with the same problems on several occasions. First, one must consider their architecture. There are several issues you can run into with .config files in ASP.NET based on deployments.
Considering the architectural ramifications:
Single tier (one server):
A simple web application may be able to leverage a reference to the sites Web.config file and resolve your issues. This would be a fine solution for a single tier application. In the case of a windows application leveraged as a .exe file, the App.config will work too.
Multi-tier (more than one server):
Here is where things became a bit hairy for me the first time I was working with .config files across boundries. Remember the hierarchy of the config structure and keep this in mind (MSDN Article on .Config structure) - there is a machine.config at the root in the appropriate ASP.NET folder. These reside at each physical server. These are overridden by the site Web.config (or App.config) which are in turn overridden by subfolder .config files. If you have more than one .config file you may want to use one of the methods to pass the file path for the specific .config you want to use. More importantly, these files each may have connection information. ASP.NET's machine.config holds some for the framework ... so you should at least be senstive to the fact this is an "inheritance" chain. Second, any changes to the Web.config file once deployed will tell the application to restart. This will result in loss of state (bad if you have active users on the site). The way around this is to keep a separate .config file (e.g. connections.config) and put a reference to that file in the Web.config. This will allow you to change the connection information (e.g. password) without having to restart the application. Here is a link to more info: MSDN: Working with Configuration Files. This article lays out all the details you need to be aware of in a normal server / IIS deployed application. Keep in mind that the .config files are mainly intended for applications, not libraries. If you have several tiers, chances are you are using some communicaiton / messaging layer (e.g. WCF). This will have / allow its own Web.config. You can keep connection strings there (and encrypt them if needed), but better yet, put them in a second file referenced by the Web.config for manageability. One final point, if you are ever going to consider the cloud, .config files are wrapped for application deployments which in effect removes all of the benefits they offer in terms of "not having restart or redeploy". Azure deployments will want to consider this article to save themselves from nightmares of maintenance: Bill Lodin blog - Configuration files in Azul / Cloud. One other point on this article – great example on how to programmatically select configuration depending on deployment! Be sure to check that out if you want to add flexibility to deploy in or out of the cloud .
I hope these points saves all of you time and headaches. I know I lost a couple days of programming time dealing with these issues ... and it was hard to find all the reasons in one place why may app was not "implementing" its connection object. Hopefully this will save you all from the same fate I had.