Coldfusion 8 and 9 on Windows Server 2003, Server 2008, Vista, and Windows 7 (x86 and x64)
I wrote a blog entry over a year ago discussing how to install Coldfusion on Windows 2008.
With the imminent release of Windows 7 and several user comments I decided to update the instructions for myself and anyone else who finds it useful.
I've installed Coldfusion 8 and 9 on most versions of Windows. I used the default setup options.
To make the Coldfusion install as painless as possible you need to take a few pre-installation steps.
(Unless otherwise noted the instructions apply across all versions.)
- Installer MUST be run using an administrator account.
- Ensure Windows and IIS components installed. NOTE: Core installs are not supported.
- Check ISAPI Extensions and Filters.
- Check ALL the IIS6 management items.
-
x64 USERS ONLY:
If you are installing 32-bit Coldfusion on a 64-bit Windows platform you need to ensure that your IIS application pool is setup to run 32-bit applications.
- Windows Vista / Server 2003 / Server 2008cscript %SystemDrive%\inetpub\AdminScripts\adsutil.vbs set w3svc/AppPools/Enable32bitAppOnWin64 1
- Windows 7%windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd set apppool /apppool.name:DefaultAppPool /enable32BitAppOnWin64:true
- Windows Vista / Server 2003 / Server 2008
Notes
Installing the 64-bit version will likely break any code that excutes 32-bit code (i.e. CFX and COM). I've also run into intermentent issues when using <cfexecute> to call a 32-bit executable.500 Errors
500 errors are like the BSOD of IIS. Something didn't work and IIS doesn't know why.
Here are a few things that you can try before completely hosing your install:
-
Check permissions! (I hate that one.)
- Does the Coldfusion service account have access to the resource you are trying to access?
- Does the IIS user have access to the resource?
- Is the Coldfusion service running?
-
Are the appropriate IIS mappings setup? By doing the pre-install steps, the Coldfusion installer should setup the appropriate IIS mappings.
-
Errors occur on a specific page?
- YES: Any CFX tags or remote service dependent tags like cfexchangeconnection on the page?
- NO: Ensure non-Coldfusion content is accessible (i.e. IIS is functioning).
-
Errors when browsing non-Coldfusion content?
- YES: Probably IIS related.
- NO: Coldfusion/IIS connector related.
-
Check the application pool.
- Is the application pool running?
- x64 users running 32-bit Coldfusion must enable the application pool to run 32-bit apps. See #3 above.
- The application pool might be corrupt. More on creating application pools.
i dont have any problem with opening & closing the connection, just list. do you have any idea why? appreciate help! cheers, sandra
Try connecting to a different FTP server. Determine if listing is working at. If that works, try pulling a file you know for sure exists on the FTP site. That should tell you if you are dealing with a Coldfusion problem or an issue with the FTP server software.
I'm wondering if you know the correct ColdFusion 8 code to properly export a query to Excel on both Vista and Windows 7. Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
I've exported a query to CSV before using this simple function: http://www.cflib.org/udf/QueryToCsv.
CSV's can be opened using Excel.
If you require more advanced excel processing try http://www.riaforge.org
Several Excel specific projects there.
It's working, but when I display a page with a Cold Fusion error, I now get the 500 error, instead of the usual partial page and gray box with error output that I used to get with CF on IIS 6
The thing is, if I access the page from a browser on the server itself, with address 127.0.0.1/whatever, I DO get the partial page and CF error text.
This is a real headache; if you happen to know what's happening or what I could do to fix, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks.
If you add your remote IP to the list of debugging IPs can you see the error from the remote worksation?
Yes, I have enabled debugging, and it seems to work fine.
Note that I have this experience on my default web site, as well as another site I created.
I don't think CF is doing anything differently; I suspect this has to do with IIS 7 or Windows 2008 security.
I did notice, while trying to get CF 7 running on the machine, that the various IIS errors (e.g. 401.3, 404) I saw were just terse messages when viewed over the Internet, but provided a lot more information when viewed on a local browser (then I saw complete error descriptions, a failure log link, etc.). Maybe this is related somehow.
That does sound like a permission issue. Try giving the 'Everyone' group complete acces temporarily. That will let you know for sure. Then go back and ensure that the IUSR_<Machine_Name> account has the appropriate permissions.
I got around the problem by telling ColdFusion not to output HTTP status codes (a setting in CF administrator), but that isn't ideal, since it no longer generates 404 codes for non-existent templates.
Thanks again for your help.