Over the years, Internet Information Services (IIS) -- Microsoft's flagship Web server product -- has received a lot of flak for being hacked and compromised. With the release of Windows Server 2008, however, Microsoft had the opportunity to move past those stereotypes and do something really great – and this time, the company came through. In fact, Microsoft and the IIS team went above and beyond what I had expected by completely redesigning and overhauling IIS's core functionality and design.
What's new with IIS?
Microsoft has taken the core functionality of IIS and broken it down into modules. You can take any one of these modules and break them down further by plugging, unplugging or extending them, or even ripping the code out and not using them at all.
In other words, you can turn any module in IIS on or off whenever you want. For example, if you don't use basic authentication in your websites, you can simply remove the code. Furthermore, if your application does not take advantage of common gateway interfaces (CGI), just remove that specific component.
Now when you deploy a brand new Web server, you can choose what components you want and only run those components. This not only allows you to further secure IIS but it also provides a huge performance boost as IIS will run faster than ever before.
Another area that I am impressed with is ASP.NET integration. Currently, ASP.NET sits on top of IIS and compliments it very well. In version 7.0, IIS and ASP.NET are completely integrated. Included in this integration is the entire .NET framework, ADO.NET and the next version of Microsoft's Web services platform, called Indigo.
Ease of use with IIS
So how does all this help you? Well, administrators now have one configuration point for all components as opposed to two or more, which should make life a lot easier on those using IIS.
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