microsoft web platform

I'm a huge fan of drupal, and finally decided to try out a new microsoft product by the name " Microsoft Web Platform" installer. My initial thought was, kind of cool so apparently with little effort, i can run multiple instances of drupal on my 64 bit windows 7 box. lets take a quick stab at this application, report on whether or not it was easy to install and manage, document any errors, and tool around with some of the applications in a sandbox.

running drupal from web platform

So here are the parameters we are working with no real requirements to my knowledge.

Windows 7 (x64) 64 bit (enterprise edition)
a whopping 6GB of memory
intel quad core processor
lots of extra hard drive space to tool around with (should it be needed)

Now onward to our installation documetation...

fire up internet explorer and keyed in the following website (http://www.microsoft.com/web/)
look for the green download button and click it
no need for any type of redistributable package, lets just do the defaults and get this web platform installer 2.0 rolling. This whole approach reminds me of the perl repositories. anybody remember how annoying it is to download any perl modules on a corporate network via ppm? UGH!
- apparently, this is why I'm going to love this product - we'll see
- - its free... The Web PI is a free download with no strings attached. We don’t know about you, but we definitely like free.
  - its smart... Installing Web Apps or updating the Microsoft Web Platform, Web PI’s improved validation support ensures everything just works.
  - its cultural... Available in 9 different languages. Choose your language and if a component is available in that language, Web PI will ensure you get it. (although we only need English, good to know anyway)
  - its tiny... Weighing in at under 2 megabytes, the Web PI is the fastest way to get the components that make up the Microsoft Web Platform. (is this for the platform install? drupal core itself is larger than 2MB)
  - its up-to-date... Whether you're updating or installing components, Web PI always includes the latest version of the Microsoft Web Platform. (if i create a sandbox env than fine, but I don't want this thing updating drupal modules and security without my approval)
  - its app-tastic... Popular, free and ready to install Web Apps including Umbraco, WordPress, Acquia Drupal, SugarCRM, and more! (by default and the tone of this document, i am naturally a microsoft skeptic if you have not already sensed that)
- enough already, lets click on the download it now button

at the security prompt and request to download the wplauncher.exe installer, click on run to accept and run. alternatively, you can click on save and save the installer to your os or unc path.

the download is quick as its only 83kb. btw, are you ready for another prompt? click on run to proceed. any additional options are available via the more options drop down.

the web platform installer msi will clock for a while. click on yes at the user account control request (windows 7 default) for the first time

click on yes at the second user account control request

assuming all is well, you'll be prompted with the web platform installer 2.0 wizard

now we have the oppertunity to decide which components/products we want to install.

at the "select the web platform products below or choose customize to select individual packages" we are going to setup the components needed to run our sandbox drupal installation, as well as several products. Note: this is the section where you can customize things.

under the platform tab, click on the following...

place a green check mark to the right of web server by click ing on the component
click on frameworks and runtimes
click on database... although not completely necessary. if you are just out to install some of the cms systems avalible via the web platform it may be just a good idea to not even incluse this option
click on the tools option... go for it, many decent tools here by default.

under the web applications tab, click on the following to install drupal and some of the more popular cms systems. for starts, we are going to install drupal. place a check mark next to acquia drupal version 1.2.19 and Drupal 6.14 core.

The download size is aprx 9MB
the default version is 1.2.19 (drupal core 6.14)

now that we have made our necessary selections, click on install to kick this thing off

after reviewing your selections click on I accept to complete and install. if you scroll down to the bottom of your selections, it will tell you the overal total file download size > our selections total in at 181.23 MB

Since we have selected the sql server express to host our drupal, you will be prompted to configure. In this scenario, we are now going to select mixed mode authentication and set our sql server administrator password.

now we need to set the administrator username: root access.
key in something you can remember and click on continue to start the install.

Step number 14 took a while to complete. Now that our sql server express stup is complete. we are now prompted to install/configure drupal. I think the neat thing about this microsoft's web platform is that we are going to host drupal entirely on an iis 7 configuration.

under web site, lets allow the default web site option
for application name key in acquia-drupal (http://localhost:80/acquia-drupal)
for web site name i'm going to call it sandbox
Click on continue to to move forward.

at step 2 of 2 accept thefollowing:

choose your database - mysql
create a new or use an existing database - create new database
database administrator - root
database administrator password - ***
database user name - drupaluser
database password - ***
database server - localhost
database name - drupal
click on continue to proceed

assuming all went well - the web platform installer will fire up and set up your drupal configuration.

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