Use it when you move to another Windows server. You can even use it to load a new website so you don’t have to configure PHP or any other extensions or loadable modules. Keep in mind if you do want to load a new website to duplicate the configuration you’ll have to change the host headers and IP address assigned to the new site in Windows Server IIS manager.

Let’s get started.

First thing to do is start IIS manager. Start > Administrative Tools > Internet Information Services(IIS) Manager.

Once you have it open right click Websites and select New > New website from file. A browse to box will popup and you can browse to the location you saved the site configuration to.

Once you browse to the file click Read. In the bottom box some text will scroll and it will say successful if it imported correctly. If it didn’t it will tell you the errors. You can manually edit the xml file to correct the errors if you wish.

If you used this to create a new website with the same configuration as an existing site then right click the new website and change host headers and IP address.

Thats’ it. If you have any questions post a comment to this article. If you need one on one help visit Admin Reports Forum.

You can find the forum at Windows Server Forums

Password protecting websites, directories and files on Windows 2003 Servers is very easy. It only takes a couple clicks and it’s done. For users to access the protected areas they’ll need to have an account on the server. There are ways to avoid this by using Passport authorization, but for this article we’ll use Integrated Windows authentication.

First thing to do is open IIS Manager. Once you have it open select the website that has the directory or file you want to protect. Click on the + next to the website to expand the directory and file list.
Right click the directory or file and select properties. A property box will popup. Now select the Directory Security tab at the top of the properties dialogue.
Select Authentication and access control by clicking the button that says edit.
Uncheck the box that says enable anonymous access. Check the box below that says Intergrated Windows Authentication.
Close the box and select apply in the properties box. The directory is now protected and can only be accessed by users that have a valid user account on your server. Test it out by going to yoursite.tld/protected_directory.

If you want to password protect a directory or file in the website click the website in the left window and when the files expand in the right window right click the directory or file and follow the procedure above to password protect it.
If you have any questions post a comment to this article ask in Windows/IIS Forum.

Choose your team carefully. If your forum is s startup don’t advertise for staff. Instead watch how members interact with each other. For one new communities don’t need moderators until the member base increases. By the time the membership gets to 100 you’ll have a good sampling of posts and get a good feel for who would make a good team member. Ask that person or persons as the case may be if they would be interested. Once you have a few leaders in place then put in some sort of nomination and voting process to add more team members. It is imperative that team members have input on this process. They are the ones that have to “work” with the other members of the team.

Once you have your team in place then as an admin step back from moderation duties and concentrate on maintaining the site and being a part of the community. Make sure you have guidelines in place for them to follow and make sure they have a say in creating them. Once that is done let your team run things. After all you put them in place so you should trust them to run the place for you. Never give the team the impression that you are watching every move they make. If one of the team members does something you don’t think is right then discuss it with them privately. Never call a person out in public. As the site grows or as team members retire let you team select the replacements. After they decide who to promote do the promotion and welcome the new leader. Never run a community as a dictator.

Now you have an active community and have your team in place. For whatever reason team members become inactive for long periods of time. Everyone at one time or another has to change priorities and doesn’t have the time to devote to a community. Most of the time these people end up coming back and getting involved again once time permits. I myself have had staff members leave for a year or more and come back to the community and become an active leader.
So what do you do with these inactives?
Nothing. Leave them be. They aren’t hurting anything. Instead nominate another member or ask your team for nominations and promote who they choose. Whatever you do do not remove them without first contacting them. Send them an email, not a PM, if they are inactive they won’t see the PM, and ask them if they would like to retire from their position. Some will tell you they will be back as soon as time permits and ask that you leave them. Let them be. Some will retire, but, ask for the option to have the position back if they become active again. Tell them that is what you’ll do. Move them into a retired group with read permissions on the staff forums. From my experience a retired leader will come back and read the staff forum to catch up on new rules before they ask for reinstatement. Once they ask welcome them back with open arms. In any case never remove a staff member without first conversing with them.
There is really no reason to remove staff for inactivity.

Staff disagreements happen. The best thing to do is to let them air their differences in the staff forum. If staff members start to argue in public move the post to the staff forum. Let the ones that have the disagreement try and work things out. Whatever you do don’t take sides. Let them work this out themselves. The problem will die out pretty fast and things will be back to normal.

The above is tried and true. It has worked on every community that I own or have owned. It took a while for me to be able to just sit back and let my teams run the place. I can enjoy the communities more by participating in my communities instead of managing them. I’m sure you will too.