Professional Microsoft IIS 8

Introducing the Main Characters

For the sake of this chapter, it is useful to define two different types of personnel by their roles. In the real world, there are many similar situations to the ones we'll use here. For example, in training scenarios, there are teachers and students; in the workplace, there are managers and employees; and in sports, there are coaches and athletes. Likewise, in this world of website delegation, there are the system administrators, who have full access to the IIS server; and there are the site administrators, who can only do what they have been enabled to do by the system administrators. Sometimes, to the dismay of the developers and often to the delight of the system administrators, the parallels to the examples above are pretty accurate. It is the job of the system administrator to run a tight ship and give access only where it is absolutely necessary. Henceforth, these two roles will be affectionately known as the system administrator and the site administrator.

Note

It is also possible to delegate administration of applications, not just entire websites; however, it gets a bit wordy to say “site and application administrator” over and over again. In this chapter, “site and application” is usually shortened to “site.”

System Administrator

In the IIS world, the system administrators are often those who install the operating system and configure IIS exactly to their liking. They may not be in a management position within the company, but ...