Galin Iliev's blog

IIS7 is grew to a development platform and become the most wanted feature in the new Windows Server 2008. But this is not the end - IIS7 Admin Pack first CTP is here and provides a nice set of features that can help you to understand what is happening on the server...

here are new features in short:

• Database Manager: Built-in SQL Server database management, including the ability to create, delete, and edit tables and indexes, create/edit SPROCs and execute custom queries.  Because it is integrated in the IIS administration tool it all works over HTTP/SSL - which means you can use the module to remotely manage your hosted applications (even with low-cost shared hosting accounts), without having to expose your database directly on the Internet.

• Log Reports: Built-in report visualization with charting support for log files data.  Full range selection and custom chart creation is supported, as well as the ability to print or save reports.  Like the database manager you can use this module remotely over HTTP/SSL - which means it works in remote shared hosting scenarios.

• Configuration Editor: This is a power module that provides complete control over editing all web.config settings within the admin tool.  You can configure it to track the changes you make using the UI and have it auto-generate configuration change scripts that you can then save and tweak to re-run later in an automated way.

• Request Filtering UI: This admin module provides more control over the new request filtering feature in IIS7.  Check out Carlos' blog post here for details on how to use it.

• .NET Authorization: This admin module provides a custom authorization rules editor which allows you to more easily manage the ASP.NET <authorization> configuration section.

• FastCGI UI: This admin module provides more support for editing all the new <fastCGI> settings (for when you use FastCGI modules with IIS7 like PHP).

While DB manager can save you time jumping between applications Log Reports definitely rocks. It gives you an option to view activities on the server in very convenient form in following categories:

• Web Server\Status code:  This report gives the comparison between number of hits and status code.
• Web Server\Hits Per Url: This report gives the comparison between number of hits and the Url.
• Web Server\Hits By Hour: This report gives the comparison between number of hits and the Hour.
• Web Server\User Agent: This report gives the comparison between number of hits and the User Agent.
• Web Server\File Extension: This report gives the comparison between number of hits and the file extension.
• Web Server\User: This report gives the comparison between number of hits and the User.
• Web Server\Time Taken: This report gives the comparison between Average time taken and the Url.
• Web Server\Win32 Errors: This report gives the comparison between Hits and the Win32 Errors.
• Web Server\Client Machine: This report gives the comparison between Hits and the Client Machine.
• Web Server\Http Method: This report gives the comparison between Hits and the Http Method.

Just see these screenshots:

For more info visit these links:

• ScottGu blog post
• CarlosAg blog post - the guy who directly runs this team.
• Using the Administration Pack