Using IIS on Windows Server 2008

Follow these steps to run the WhatsUp Gold web interface through an IIS (Internet Information Services) Web server on Windows Server 2008. This procedure assumes that you are using the default instance of Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition that is delivered with WhatsUp Gold and that WhatsUp Gold, SQL Server 2005 Express, and Internet Information Server are all installed on the same server.

Important: Throughout the procedure below, Windows Server 2008 may periodically ask you to confirm that you want to perform certain tasks that require administrative privileges. If this occurs, select OK.

  1. Stop or close the following services and applications:

    Tip: You can use the WhatsUp Services Controller to manage services. For more information, see Using the WhatsUp Services Controller.

    • Ipswitch Alert Center
    • Ipswitch Discovery
    • Ipswitch Flow Collector
    • Ipswitch Web Server$WhatsUp (or IIS)
    • Ipswitch WhatsUp Engine
    • Ipswitch Service Control Manager
    • WhatsUp Gold Task Tray application (Task Tray icon located in the lower right section of the task bar)
    • WhatsUp Gold Desktop Action application (Action Alerts Task Tray icon located in the lower right section of the task bar)
    • Internet Information Services (which appears as the World Wide Web Publishing Service in the Services applet of the Control Panel)
  2. Specify a username and password for WhatsUp Gold to use when connecting to the database.
    1. From the Windows Start menu, select Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Data Sources and select the System DSN tab.
      - OR -
      For 64-bit OSs start the Command Prompt (click Start > Run), enter c:\Windows\SysWOW64\odbcad32.exe, then select the System DSN tab in the ODBC Data Source Administrator dialog.
    2. Select the WhatsUp DSN and click Configure. The Configuration wizard appears.
    3. Verify that the fields in the first dialog are correct for your SQL Server authentication preferences, then click Next.
    4. On the second dialog, verify that the With SQL Server authentication using login ID and password entered by the user option is selected. In the Login field, enter the SQL username. In the Password field, enter the SQL user's password. Click Next.

      Note: For the default instance of Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition installed with WhatsUp Gold, the default username is sa and the password is WhatsUp_Gold.

    5. On the third dialog, verify that Change the default database to is selected and that the WhatsUp database appears in the drop-down menu. Click Next.
    6. Continue to click Next until you come to the final dialog, then click Finish. The ODBC Microsoft SQL Server Setup dialog opens. You can click Test Data Source to test the configuration or click OK.
    7. Repeat steps b-f for the NetFlow DSN.
  3. Configure WhatsUp Gold and its plug-ins to use the updated username and password for the database.
    1. Open the WhatsUp Gold Database Configuration Utility from the Start menu at Start > Programs > Ipswitch WhatsUp Gold > Utilities > Database Configuration Utility.
    2. Select Use SQL Server Authentication.
    3. Enter the Username and Password that you entered in the DSN, then click Connect. The utility verifies the connection information. If the information is correct, the Update Registry dialog appears.

      Note: For the default instance of Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition installed with WhatsUp Gold, the default username is sa and the password is WhatsUp_Gold.

    4. Verify that Restart the WhatsUp service after the update is not selected.
    5. Click Save. The utility updates the database connection settings and restarts effected services. The Finished dialog appears.
    6. Click Finish. The Database Configuration Utility closes.
  4. Create a Windows user to serve as the user context under which the WhatsUp Gold web interface runs.
    1. Open Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management. The Computer Management application appears.
    2. Select Local User and Groups, then select the Users folder.
    3. From the menu, select Action > New User. The New User dialog appears.
    4. Enter the information for the new user. We recommend using a name that is easily identifiable as the WhatsUp Gold user, such as WhatsUpUser or WUGUser.
    5. Clear User must change password at next logon.
    6. Click Create. The new user is created.
    7. Click Close to close the New User dialog.
    8. Double-click the new user. The Properties dialog for the user appears.
    9. Select the Member Of tab. A list of groups to which this user belongs appears.
    10. Add the new user to the Administrators group.
    11. Click OK, and then close the Computer Management window.
    12. The user is now ready to be used by the WhatsUp Gold web interface.

      Note: If you specify a user that does not have administrative privileges, the web interface cannot interact with Windows services. This means that you cannot view the status of services or start, stop, or restart services from the web interface. In this case, you must log in to Windows to manage services through the Control Panel.

  5. Verify that IIS is installed and properly configured.
    1. Open Control Panel > Programs and Features.
    2. From the Tasks pane on the left side of the window, select Turn Windows Features on or off. The Windows Features dialog appears.
    3. On the left pane of the Server Manager dialog, select Roles.
    4. On the right pane of the Server Manager dialog, select Web Server (IIS) > Role Services.
    5. Verify that Web Server, ASP, Static Content, HTTP Redirection, and Default Document appear with a status of Installed under the Role Service column.
  6. Create an IIS application pool for WhatsUp Gold to use.
    1. Open Control Panel > Administrative Tools. The Administration Tools window appears.
    2. Double-click Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager. The Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager appears.
    3. In the Connections pane on the left side of the window, expand the item that corresponds to the name of the server on which you are working.
    4. Right-click on Application Pools and select Add Application Pool. The Add Application Pool dialog appears.
    5. In Name, enter NmConsole.
    6. Under .NET Framework version, select the highest version available.
    7. Under Managed pipeline mode, select Classic.
    8. Click OK. The new application pool is created.
  7. Configure advanced settings on the NmConsole application pool.

    Important: If you are using a 64-bit OS, make sure that you set the NmConsole Application Pool Advanced Settings option for Enable 32-bit Applications to True.

    1. Right-click the NmConsole application pool from the list, then select Advanced Settings from the right-click menu. The Advanced Settings dialog appears.
    2. Expand Process Model, then select the Identity row. Click the browse (...) button that appears in the second column. The Application Pool Identity dialog appears.
    3. Select Custom account, then click Set. The Set Credentials dialog appears.
    4. Enter the name and password of the user you created for the WhatsUp Gold web interface to run as (for example, WUGUser), then click OK.
    5. Make sure the Maximum Worker Processes are set to 1.
    6. Click OK to exit the Advanced Settings dialog.
  8. Create an IIS application for the WhatsUp Gold web interface.
    1. In the Connections pane on the left side of the screen, under Sites, locate the Web site under which you want WhatsUp Gold to run. Right-click it and select Add Application. The Add Application dialog appears.
    2. In Alias, enter NmConsole.
    3. Click the Select button next to Application pool. The Select Application Pool dialog appears.
    4. Select the NmConsole application pool, then click OK.
    5. In Physical path, enter (or use the browse button to select) the path to the WhatsUp Gold web interface. This should be located at <WhatsUp Gold install path>\HTML\NmConsole\.
    6. Click Connect As. The Connect As dialog appears.
    7. Select Specific user, then click Set. The Set Credentials dialog appears.
    8. Enter the name and password of the user you created for the WhatsUp Gold web interface to run as, then click OK.
    9. Click OK to close the Connect As dialog.

      Tip: After configuring the settings for the application, click Test Settings to verify that everything is configured correctly.

    10. Click OK. The new application is created.
  9. Modify the ASP settings for the NmConsole application.
    1. In the Connections pane on the left side of the window, select the NmConsole application.
    2. In the center section of the screen, under the IIS heading, double-click ASP.
    3. Under Enable Parent Paths, select True. This option is required to support use of the relative paths used to navigate in the WhatsUp Gold web interface.
    4. Expand Limits Properties.
    5. Change the value of Maximum Requesting Entity Body Limit to 8000000.
    6. Change the value of Response Buffering Limit to 8000000.
    7. In the Actions pane on the right side of the window, click Apply.
  10. To prevent a port conflict, the internal web server must be set to use another port, such as 8080, or must be disabled. This can be done on the WhatsUp Gold console at Configure > Program Options > Web Server.

    Note: If you configure the Web Server to run on a port other than the port you specified during the installation of WhatsUp Gold, you must configure the Windows Firewall to allow traffic on that port.

    If you disable the WhatsUp web interface, verify that reports still load correctly by right-clicking a device in the WhatsUp Gold console and selecting Device Reports. If not, double-check the settings on the Program Options > Web Server panel and verify the Web server port in the Web report access from Windows console section contains the port number used by IIS.

  11. Restart the services and applications you stopped in Step 1. You can use the WhatsUp Services Controller to manage services. For more information, see Using the WhatsUp Services Controller.
  12. Connect to the WhatsUp web interface by opening a browser and entering the following address in the Address box:

    http://<ip_address - or - hostname>:port/NmConsole/

    Examples
    http://192.168.1.200/NmConsole/

    http://192.168.1.200:8080/NmConsole/

    http://www.ipswitch.com:8080/NmConsole/