Thursday 24 May 2012

Install .NET 1.1 on SBS 2011

Installing .NET (dotnet)1.1 on SBS 2011 is to be avoided if possible as upon installation because it aggressively changes the IIS & SBS .NET configuration.
Some of the effects of installing .NET 1.1 include:
- "Companyweb" not working
- "Connect" site not working
- Exchange Management Console not working
- WSUS service not working

A saving grace is that core server functionality is still intact.

If you absolutely must install it (e.g. Quickbooks DB Manager) there is a way around the problem:
After installing the .NET 1.1 package...

This is what I did to restore the server to normal :
- Open admin command prompt
- CD to  c:\windows\microsoft.net\framework64\2.0.50727
- Run the following "aspnet_regiis /i"
- Run the same command in c:\windows\microsoft.net\framework64\v4.0.30319
- Run a repair on the .NET 4 install (from the Control Panel)
- Reboot the server

- Open the IIS Configuration console

- For the highlighted entry - change the Executable path to ..\Framework64\.. rather than \Framework\
(the ..\Framework\.. refers to the 32bit version of .NET 4 which is incompatible)

- Ensure all ASP .NET extensions are allowed

- Ensure that all the Application Pools are set to the correct version of .NET as above. (They are all incorrectly set to v4.0 initially)
- Reboot the server.

You should now have a functional SBS 2011 server with .NET 1.1 installed

I cobbled this solution together from the following sources:
http://msmvps.com/blogs/bradley/archive/2011/04/16/promise-me-you-won-t-try-to-do-this.aspx
http://brendon.davis.to/2012/02/06/sbs-2011-and-net-framework-1-1/
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/exchangesvrdeploy/thread/cee39a9d-5fa0-496c-89a5-aef857014cc1



2 comments:

  1. Most handy, I had to install the horrible .NET 1.1 to get the latest Australian Quickbooks running on a new SBS 2011 box and this has rescued it!

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  2. Just like to point out that you saved my skin today, installed .Net 1.1 on SBS 2011 to get an old application up and running without realising what sort of havoc it would cause! Thanks to your guide I managed to get everything back up and running before my client even realised there was an issue.

    In addition, I found that you don't need to restart the server completely after fixing all of this up, simply restarting the "World Wide Web Publishing Service" Windows service does the trick.

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