[This is preliminary documentation and subject to change]

Virtual Directory Property Sheet

Use the Virtual Directory property sheet to create and manage virtual directories on your Web site. A virtual directory is a directory that is not physically contained within the home directory, but which appears as though it were to users who visit your Web site. Use the radio buttons and the following text box on this property sheet to change the location of your virtual directory.

A virtual directory can be mapped to any of the following:

- A directory located on the server you are configuring; for example, C:\Catalog\Shoes. To search on the local drive for a file, click the Browse button.
- A share located on another computer; for example, \\webserver\htmlfiles. Type the user name and password needed to access that computer.
- A redirection to a URL; for example, http://tempserver. Browsers requesting a resource at the original URL are automatically given the destination URL provided in the Redirect To text box so that they can request the resource again. To map requests to a virtual directory, use a virtual path; for example, /newcatalog.

Access Permissions

Read To allow users to read or download files or directories, and their associated properties, select this option.

Write To allow users to upload files, and their associated properties, to the enabled directory on your server, or to change content in a Write-enabled file, select this option. Write can only be done with a browser that supports the PUT feature of the HTTP 1.1 protocol standard.

Script source access To allow users to access source code if either Read or Write permissions are set, select this option. Source code includes scripts in ASP applications.

Directory browsing To allow the user a hypertext listing of the files and subdirectories in this virtual directory, select this option. Virtual directories will not appear in directory listings; users must know a virtual directory's alias.

Important Your Web server will display an "Access Forbidden" error message in the user's Web browser if a user attempts to access file or directory and both of the following items are true:

- Directory browsing is disabled.
- The user does not specify a file name, such as filename.htm.

Log visits To record visits to this directory in a log file, select this option. Visits are recorded only if logging is enabled for this Web site.

Index this resource To allow Microsoft Indexing Service to include this directory in a full-text index of your Web site, select this option. A full-text index enables users to quickly search for words or phrases in published documents.

Application Settings

An IIS Web-based application is defined by the directory structure in which it is located. To make this directory an application starting point (and thus create an application), click the Create button. To dissociate this home directory from an application, click the Remove button.

Execute permissions

Execute permissions determine what level of program execution is allowed for this site or virtual directory resources.

- None Only static files, such as HTML or image files, can be accessed.
- Scripts only Only scripts, such as ASP scripts, can be run.
- Scripts and Executables All file types can be accessed or executed.

Application Protection

Select whether applications are run in the same process as Web services (low), in an isolated pooled process in which other applications are also run (medium), or in an isolated process separate from other processes (high).

The client will be sent to:

These properties appear when you select a redirection to a URL.

The Exact URL Entered Above redirects a virtual directory to the destination URL without adding any other portions of the original URL. You can use this option to redirect an entire virtual directory to one file. For example, to redirect all requests for the /scripts virtual directory to the file Default.htm in the home directory, type /Default.htm in the Redirect To text box and select this option.

A Directory Below This One redirects a parent directory to a child directory. For example, to redirect your home directory (designated by /) to a subdirectory named /newhome, type /newhome in the Redirect To text box and select this option. Without this option, the Web server will continually map the parent to itself.

A Permanent Redirection for This Resource sends the following message to the client: "301 Permanent Redirect." Redirects are considered temporary, and the client browser receives the following message: "302 Temporary Redirect." Some browsers can use the "301 Permanent Redirect" message as the signal to permanently change a URL, such as a bookmark.

© 1997-2001 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.