This is from a post in the ASP.Net classroom that details the hardware and software requirements for the ASP.Net course. In a nutshell, you will need

1. Some version of the .Net software (VB.Net Standard will do, Visual Studio.Net is fine also)
2. IIS. IIS comes with XP Professional--but not the Home Edition. If you elect to setup your own domain, then you don't need IIS--you can do all your work from your own Server.
3. MSDE (Developer's edition of SQL Server) for the database portion of the course. Can be downloaded for free from the Microsoft Web Site

For more details, check below :)

How to install and use the software and downloadable files for the textbook

To develop web applications, you need to have Visual Studio .NET or the Standard Edition of Visual Basic .NET installed on your PC. If you want to run these applications form a web server on your own PC rather than a remote server, you need to install IIS. And if you want to access databases that are on your own PC rather than on a remove server, you need to install MSDE (Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Desktop Engine). 

This appendix describes how to install these products. It also describes the files for this book that are available for download from our web site and tells you how you can use them.

How to use the downloadable files

Throughout this book, you'll see complete applications that illustrate the material presented in each chapter. To help you understand how they work, you download the source code and data for these applications from our web site. Then, you can open and run them in Visual Studio. These files come in a single download, as summarized in figure A-1. This figure also describes how you download, install, and use these files.

When you download the single install file and execute it, it will install all of the files for this book in the Murach\ASP.Net folder on your C drive. Within this folder, you'll find a folder named Book applications that contains the source code for all the Windows applications in this book. The source code is organized in folders by applications within chapters. For example, the source files for the Halloween Store application in Chapter 3 are stored in

C:\Murach\ASP.NET\Book applications\Chapter_03\HaloweenSotre

After you prepare these applications for use on your server, you can then use Visual Studio to open and run them.

The preferred sequence for software installation

Chances are that you already have the software you need for running ASP.Net web applications installed on your PC. But if you don't, figure A-1 shows you the preferred sequence for installing the required Microsoft software.

In particular, if you want to use the IIS web server on your own PC instead of on a remove server, you should install IIS before you install Visual Studio.Net and the .NET Framework. Otherwise, you will need to fix the .Net Framework as shown in figure A-2 and re-install Visual Studio.Net as shown in figure A-3. Once you've got IIS, Visual Studio.Net and the .Net Framework installed, you can install MSDE if you want to work with databases that are stored on your own PC, and you can prepare your PC for running the web applications that come with this book.

Figure A-1 How to use the downloadable files for this book

What the downloadable application file for this book contains

• The source code for all of the applications presented in the book
• The Halloween database used in these applications
• A batch file that uses a SQL script to install the databases as required

How to download and install the files for this book

• Go to www.murach.com and go to the page for Murach's ASP.Net Web Programming with VB.Net
• Click on the link for "Free download of the book applications." Then, download "All book files." This will download one file named vasp_allfiles.exe to your C drive (John Smiley Note: Select the 2003 link and it will download vasp_allfiles2003.exe).
• Use the Windows Explorer to find the downloaded file on your C drive. Then, double-click on this file and respond to the dialog boxes that follow. This installs the files in folders that start with C:\Murach\ASP.Net

The preferred sequence for software installation

1. If you want to run your web applications from a web server on your own PC, install IIS as shown in Figure A-2
2. Install Visual Studio.Net and the .Net Framework as shown in Figure A-3
3. If you want to work with databases on your own PC, install MSDE as shown in Figure A-4
4. Prepare your PC for running the applications that come with this book as shown in Figure A-5

Note:

• If you're using Windows XP Home Edition, IIS is not available, so you won't be able to run web applications using just your PC. You'll need a separate web server.

How to install IIS

If you want to run ASP.Net web applications from a web server on your own PC, you need to install IIS as shown in Figure A-2. Note, however, that you can't install IIS if you're using Windows XP Home Edition (in that case, IIS isn't available to you, and you'll have to have access to a separate web server.) John Smiley Note: Within VB.Net, you can click on the Web Resources link in the Start Menu to discover Web Sites that allow you to develop ASP.Net applications for free.

To start the installation, you display the Add or Remove Programs dialog box and then click on the Add/Remove Windows Components link. When you do, the Windows Components Wizard starts and a second dialog box is displayed. This dialog box lists all the available Windows components. The components that are currently installed have a check mark in front of them. To install another component (in this case, IIS), just check it, click on the Next button, and complete the dialog boxes that are displayed.

As I've already mentioned, if you're going to use IIS on your own PC, you should install it before you install the .Net Framework and Visual Studio.Net. If you've already installed the .Net Framework, though, you can repair it after installing IIS. To do that, you can execute the command show in Figure A-2. This command runs an executable file named dotnetfx.exe that can be found on one of the Visual Studio.Net installation CD's. In contrast, if you've installed Visual Studio before you install IIS, you'll need to re-install Visual Studio as described in Figure A-3.

In Chapter 2 of this book, you'll learn how to open a web application from Visual Studio using the Open Project From Web dialog box. In some cases, we've found that this won't work without selecting an IIS option that isn't selected by default. If you have trouble using this dialog box, then you'll need to use the Internet Information Services program to select this option.

Step 2 of Figure A-5 describes how you start the Internet Information Services program. Once you start it, expand the server node and the Web Sites node (if necessary) to display the Default Web Site node. Then, right-click the Default Web Site node and choose Properties from the menu that's displayed to display the Properties dialog box for the default web site. Next, click the Home Directory tab and check the Directory browsing option. Click the OK button to save the change. Now, the next time you start Visual Studio, the Open Project From Web dialog box should work properly.

Figure A-2 How to Install IIS

Description

• To install IIS, display the Windows Control Panel, and double-click on the Add/Remove Programs icon to display the Add/Remove Programs dialog box. Then, click on Add/Remove Windows Components to display the Windows Components Wizard, select Internet Information Services (IIS) from the list of components that are displayed, and click on the Next button to complete the installation.

When and how to repair the .Net Framework

• If you install IIS after installing the .NET Framework, you will need to repair the Framework. To do that, insert the Visual Studio.Net Windows Component Update CD. Then, click on the Start button in the Widows Taskbar, choose the run command, and enter this command:

        <CD Drive>:\dotNetFramework\dotnetfx.exe /t:c\temp /c:"msiexec.exe /fvecms c:\temp\netfx.msi"

When and how to re-install Visual Studio.Net

• If you install IIS after installing Visual Studio.Net, you will need to reinstall Visual Studio as described in Figure A-3.

How to install the .NET Framework and Visual Studio.Net

If you've installed Windows applications before, you shouldn't have any trouble installing Visual Studio.Net. You simply insert the first Visual Studio CD, and the setup program starts automatically. This setup program will lead you through the steps for installing Visual Studio as summarized in Figure A-2.

The first step of the installation procedure for Visual Studio.Net (or the Standard Edition of Visual Basic.Net) is to update the Windows components. During this step, the components of the .Net framework will be installed on your system. The second step is to install Visual Studio itself. Although you have a variety of options for what's actually installed, it's safest to just accept the defaults unless you're familiar with the various components and know exactly what you need. The final step is to apply any updates that have become available since the product was released. Note that if you do that and updates are available, a link will appear on the Visual Studio Start page that you can use to install the updates.

Figure A-3 How to install the .NET Framework and Visual Studio.Net

How to install Visual Studio.Net

• To install Visual Studio.Net, insert Disc 1 of the Visual Studio.Net CD's, and the setup program will start automatically.
• If the .Net Framework has not been installed on your system, the installation program will detect this, and you will need to install it before installing Visual Studio.Net. To do that, click on the Windows Component Update link in the Setup dialog box.
• After the .Net Framework is installed, click on the Visual Studio.Net link and follow the instructions to install Visual Studio.Net. When the Options page is displayed, you can usually just accept the default options unless you have special requirements.
• After you install Visual Studio.Net, click on the Service Releases link to check for and install any updates that are available

What if you're using Visual Basic.Net

• The setup program for the Standard Edition of Visual Basic.Net is similar to the setup program for Visual Studio.Net, but fewer options are available on the Options page

When and how to re-install Visual Studio.Net

• If you've installed Visual Studio.Net before you installed IIS, you need to re-install Visual Studio. To do that, display the Add or Remove Programs dialog box. Then, highlight Visual Studio.Net and click the Change/Remove button to start the Visual Studio setup program. Click the Visual Studio.Net link, and then click the Repair/Reinstall link in the dialog box that's displayed.

How to install MSDE and use it with our databases

If you're using Visual Studio.Net 2002, the files you need to install MSDE are copied to your hard drive by default when you install Visual Studio. Then, you can simply run the Setup.exe program as described in Figure A-4 to install MSDE. Otherwise, you can locate and run this program from the Visual Studio CD's. Note that this setup program doesn't display any dialog boxes or give any options like most setup programs do. In other words, it executes without interruption.

If you're using Visual Studio.Net 2003, you need to download the files for installing MSDE from Microsoft's web site. This web site also provides instructions for installing MSDE once you download these files. To do that, you have to run the Setup.exe program from the command prompt. To get to the command prompt, click the Start button, select Run, and enter cmd or command in the dialog box that's displayed.

After you install MSDE, you'll notice a server icon near the right side of the Windows taskbar. If you double-click on this icon, the SQL Server Service Manager dialog box is displayed. You can use this dialog box to start, continue, pause, or stop the SQL Server engine. By default, SQL Server is started each time you start your PC. If that's not what you want, you can remove the check mark from the Auto-start option in this dialog box. Then you can start SQL Server whenever you need it using this dialog box.

Although you don't need to know much about how MSDE works to use it, you should know that when you run the setup program, it creates a copy of SQL Server and gives it a name. Then, you can use that name to create connections to the databases that are accessed by that server. For Visual Studio.Net 2002, the name is the name of your computer appended with VSdotNET. When I installed MSDE with Visual Studio.Net 2002, for example, the copy of SQL Server was named ANNE\VSdotNET. For Visual Studio.Net 203, the name depends on the name you enter for the INSTANCENAME parameter when you run the Setup.exe program. If you follow the instructions on the Microsoft web site, the name will be the same as if you had installed it from the 2002 CD's.

If you want to use the databases that are available with the download for this book, you can do that without much trouble. Once you've installed the downloaded file, you can use the Windows Explorer to find and run the batch file named 

DB_Attach.bat  

in the 

C:\Murach\ASP.NET\Databases&nbs p;

folder. This batch file runs a SQL Server script named 

DB_Attach.sql 

that attaches the databases to the copy of SQL Server running on your computer. Note that the file assumes that the server name is the name of your computer appended with VSdotNET. If you specified a different name on the INSTANCENAME parameter when you installed MSDE, you can change the name in the DB_Attach.bat file using any text editor.

Figure A-4 How to install MSDE and use it with our databases

How to install and use MSDE

• If you're using Visual Studio.Net 2002, use Windows Explorer to navigate to this folder: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio.Net\Setup\MSDE. Then, double-click on the Setup.exe file to run it and install MSDE. When you're done, restart your PC.
• If you're using Visual Studio.Net 2003, use Windows Explorer to navigate to this folder: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio.Net 2003\Setup\MSDE. Then, double-click the msde_readme.htm document to display it in your browser. Click the link in that document to take you to the Microsoft web site, and follow the directions on the page that's displayed to download and install MSDE. When you're done, restart your PC.
• After you install MSDE, SQL Server will start automatically each time you start your PC. An icon will appear near the right side of the Windows taskbar to indicate that this service is running. To manager this service, double-click on the icon or select the Start->Programs->MSDE->Service Manager command to display the dialog box.
• The setup program creates a copy of SQL Server with your computer name appended with \VSdotNET. You can use this server name to define connections to the databases you add to this server, as shown throughout the book.

How to attach the databases for this book to MSDE

• If you're going to use the Halloween database used by the programs in this book on your own PC, you need to attach them to MSDE. To do that, you can use the batch file and SQL script that are downloaded and installed along with the other files for this book.
• To attach the databases to MSDE, use the Windows Explorer to navigate to the C:\Murach\ASP.NET\Databases folder, and double-click on the DB_Attach.bat file to run it. That will run the batch file and attach the database.

Note

• If you didn't select the option to install MSDE when you installed Visual Studio.Net 2002, you can install it directly from Disc 3 of the Visual Studio.Net CD's. To do that, insert this CD, navigate to the Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio.Net\Setup\MSDE folder, and double-click on the Setup.exe file to run it.

Before I go on, I want to make you aware of some problems you may encounter after installing the version of MSDE that's available from Microsoft's web site. First, the server may not appear in the SQL Server Service Manager dialog box. Then, if you need to start, stop, or pause the server, you'll have to type the server name into the Server combo box.

Second, you may not be able to see the server from the Server Explorer in Visual Studio. In that case, you can expand the Servers node, expand the node for your computer, right-click on the SQL Servers node, and select Register SQL Server Instance. Then, in the dialog box that's displayed, you can enter the name for your instance of SQL Server (the name you entered on the INSTANCENAME parameter). You may also be asked to enter the password you specified (SAPWD parameter) when you installed MSDE. At that point, you should be able to view and use the server.

How to use the downloaded web application

Before you can open and run the web applications that you've downloaded for this book, you'll need to copy them to the web server. Then, you'll need to configure them for use with IIS. If IIS is installed on your own system, you can do that by using the procedure in figure A-5.

When you install IIS on your system, it creates a folder named Inetpub on your C drive. Within this folder is a folder named wwwroot. This is where all of your web applications and services must be stored. To start, then, you'll need to copy the chapter folders that contain the web applications to this folder. You'll find the chapter folders in the C:\Murach\ADO.NET\Book applications\IIS files folder that's created when you install the files for this book.

After you copy the folders to IIS, you'll need to configure each application for use by IIS. To do that under Windows XP, you use the Internet Information Services program. Under Windows 2000, the program name is Internet Services Manager, but you work with it the same way. When you first start this program, it will list the available web servers in the left side of its window. In most cases, this list will include just the web server on your PC. Then, you can expand the node for this server and then expand the node for the default web site to display the IIS applications.

Next, locate the chapter folder that contains the application you want to use, and expand it to display the application folder. Notice that it's displayed with a folder icon rather than an IIS icon like most of the other items in the list. To configure the application for IIS, display its properties as described in Figure A-5, and then click on the Create button in the Directory tab. When you do, you'll notice that the icon for the application changes from a folder icon to an IIS icon. To compete the configuration, click on the OK button in the Properties dialog box.

Figure A-5 How to use the downloaded web applications for this book

How to use the downloaded web applications

• Use the Windows Explorer to navigate to the C:\Murach\ASP.NET\Book applications folder. Then, copy the chapter folder for the application you want to use to the C:\Inetpub\wwwroot folder
• In Windows. XP, start the Internet Information Services program using the Start->Programs->Administrative Tools->Internet Information Services command. In Windows 2000, use the Start->Programs->Administrative Tools->Internet Services Manager command
• Expand the server node and the Default Web Site node to display the available applications. Then, expand the chapter folder you just copied so you can see the folder for the application you want to use. Right-click on that folder and select the Properties command from the menu that's displayed to display the Properties dialog box for that folder.
• Display the Directory tab and then click on the Create button to configure the application for use with IIS. The icon in the Internet Information Services window will change from a folder to an IIS application icon. Click on the OK button to accept the property changes, then close the Internet Information Services program.