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Q43. Does the ASP.NET Development Server support running web pages from a computer other than the local computer?

A43. No. It will not serve pages to another computer. Additionally, it will not serve files that are outside of the application scope. The ASP.NET Development Server provides an efficient way to test pages locally before you publish the pages to a production server running IIS.

Q44. Whats the difference between running pages on ASP.NET Development Server and IIS?

A44. An important difference between the ASP.NET Development Server and IIS is the security context in which the respective servers run your ASP.NET pages. This difference can affect your testing because of differences in how the pages run.

When you run a page using the ASP.NET Development Server, the page runs in the context of your current user account. For example, if you are running as an administrator-level user, a page running in the ASP.NET Development Server will have administrator-level privileges. In contrast, in IIS, ASP.NET by default runs in the context of the special user (ASPNET or NETWORK SERVICES) that typically has limited privileges. The ASPNET or NETWORK SERVICES accounts are local to the server computer (not domain accounts), which restricts access to resources on other computers.

If you are simply reading and running the code in ASP.NET pages, this difference is not very important. However, the different security contexts for the two Web servers can affect your testing of the following:

• Access to other resources that the page requires   This can include reading and writing files other than Web pages, reading and writing the Windows registry, and so on.

• Database access   When working with the ASP.NET Development Server, you can typically rely on Windows Integrated authentication to access SQL Server. However, when the same page runs in IIS under the ASPNET or NETWORK SERVICES account, the page is running in the context of a local user, and you often have to configure the page to use a connection string that includes information about a user and password.

• Code access security   If your page involves access to resources that are protected under different zones, the page might run differently under the ASP.NET Development Server and IIS.