This video shows how to set up the Web Timesheet.  It describes the SQL and IIS requirements.

The Web app is a Microsoft .NET 4 app.  That means it needs to run on a Microsoft IIS Web Server.  You can install this onto your personal workstation for testing, but normally a web server is used.  The Web Edition also uses Microsoft SQL Server or SQL Express for the backend database.  That SQL box does not need to be the same as the IIS box.  They can be two entirely separate machines or virtual servers.  The Web.config file contains settings to connect to SQL.

 

Windows Timesheet and SQL

Before installing the Web Edition, you should consider setting up the Windows Edition.  Watch this video for connecting to a SQL database.  Make sure you can connect to a SQL database and that the Windows app runs without errors.  This gets a lot of the unknowns out of the way.  If you use SQL Authentication for  the Windows app, you'll be much farther along because the Web app can use it too.

 

SQL Server or SQL Express

The Web Edition uses a SQL Authentication login to connect to the database.   That means you must set up a new login with "SQL Authentication" and db_owner  rights to your existing database.  Before doing so, you must make sure SQL is set up to host both "SQL Server and Windows Authentication."  To do this, right-click on the top-level node in the SQL Server Management Studio and  choose Properties.  Then click Security.  The "SQL Server and Windows Authentication mode" choice is there.

It is important that your SQL login has db_owner rights.  That allows the  web app to access the database and make alteration when new versions are  installed.  At the very least it must have db_datareader and db_datawriter rights.

 

Microsoft IIS

The Web Timesheet is a .NET 4 app.  You must have .NET 4 installed and enabled.  Verify this by clicking on the top-level node in IIS and then double-clicking on "ISAPI and CGI Restrictions."  Make sure your .NET4 framework is "Allowed" here.

Currently, the web app uses an application pool named "ASP.NET v4.0 Classic."   Click the "Application Pool" node in IIS to verify that you have this.  Create one if not.  You'll use this for the "st" virtual directly.

The "st" virtual directory uses the "ASP.NET v4.0 Classic" application pool.   Click on the "st" virtual directory, and then click "Basic Settings" in the  panel at the right.  The application pool is shown.  Click Select to change it if necessary.

 

Web.config and User.config

The Web.config (or User.config) configures the connection to SQL Server (or SQL  Express).  It should be noted that your SQL machine can be separate from your IIS web server.  There are four settings required to grant access to SQL.

    Server -- the name of the SQL machine (optionally  followed by the instance name, with a backslash separator)     Database -- the name of the SQL database     Username -- the login name, must have SQL  Authentication to the database     Password -- the login password

These settings will be found in the "<appSettings>" section of Web.config (an  XML file).  You can also copy this entire section from Web.config and  create a new file named User.config to hold them.  This is valuable to  preserve your settings when installing new versions.  The Web.config file  will be overwritten on the next installation.  Because of this, you should  make a backup of both Web.config and User.config.

 

Open a Browser

You can now browse to http://yourservername/st. The login page should be displayed.

 

Also see: Video: SQL Server Database, Video: Windows and Web Timesheet

 

Back to Videos

 

More videos on YouTube