Error running ASPX test page

[gtilles]

I have site that I did in Classic ASP 5 years ago, the owner now wants to make some changes to the code. I decided to see if moving to .net was an option since the server claims to support .net.
I created a default project and created a page called WebForm1.aspx
I dragged a button to my form and in the button click put a response.write "hello"
Simple enough....
I ftp'd the bin dir with the .dll file as well as the Webform1.aspx page to the server.

I get the following error. Yet I uploaded the same files to 2 other different hosting company servers that belong to other clients and everything works as intended.
They called me back and said there was a problem with my code (typical host response) and the codebehind was pointing to a file that doesn't exist.
How is it that it works elsewhere but not on their server?
What steps can I do to troubleshoot on my end more or should I just wait to see what they find?

Server Error in '/' Application.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Runtime Error 
Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error settings for this application prevent the details of the application error from being viewed remotely (for security reasons). It could, however, be viewed by browsers running on the local server machine. 
 
Details: To enable the details of this specific error message to be viewable on remote machines, please create a <customErrors> tag within a "web.config" configuration file located in the root directory of the current web application. This <customErrors> tag should then have its "mode" attribute set to "Off".
 
 
<!-- Web.Config Configuration File -->
 
<configuration>
    <system.web>
        <customErrors mode="Off"/>
    </system.web>
</configuration>
 
 
Notes: The current error page you are seeing can be replaced by a custom error page by modifying the "defaultRedirect" attribute of the application's <customErrors> configuration tag to point to a custom error page URL.
 
 
<!-- Web.Config Configuration File -->
 
<configuration>
    <system.web>
        <customErrors mode="RemoteOnly" defaultRedirect="mycustompage.htm"/>
    </system.web>
</configuration>

[rabid lemming]

Sound like it’s the web.config file to blame, Try this code in your web.config file:

<configuration>
    <system.web>
        <customErrors mode="Off"/>
    </system.web>
</configuration>

Simply copy that to notepad and safe the file as "web.config" and the set the file save as type to "all" and not txt. Then once uploaded to the same location as the web page should fix things for you

Hope that helps

[gtilles]

Doesn't help...still get the same error.
I think that unless I'm actually on the local machine to see the actual error the most I can do is a redirect to a custom error page.

Server Error in '/' Application.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Runtime Error 
Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error settings for this application prevent the details of the application error from being viewed remotely (for security reasons). It could, however, be viewed by browsers running on the local server machine. 
 
Details: To enable the details of this specific error message to be viewable on remote machines, please create a <customErrors> tag within a "web.config" configuration file located in the root directory of the current web application. This <customErrors> tag should then have its "mode" attribute set to "Off".
 
 
<!-- Web.Config Configuration File -->
 
<configuration>
    <system.web>
        <customErrors mode="Off"/>
    </system.web>
</configuration>
 
 
Notes: The current error page you are seeing can be replaced by a custom error page by modifying the "defaultRedirect" attribute of the application's <customErrors> configuration tag to point to a custom error page URL.
 
 
<!-- Web.Config Configuration File -->
 
<configuration>
    <system.web>
        <customErrors mode="RemoteOnly" defaultRedirect="mycustompage.htm"/>
    </system.web>
</configuration>

[mendhak]

Can you post the contents of the web.config file you're uploading?

[gtilles]

Here you go!

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuration>
    
  <system.web>
 
    <!--  DYNAMIC DEBUG COMPILATION
          Set compilation debug="true" to insert debugging symbols (.pdb information)
          into the compiled page. Because this creates a larger file that executes
          more slowly, you should set this value to true only when debugging and to
          false at all other times. For more information, refer to the documentation about
          debugging ASP.NET files.
    -->
    <compilation defaultLanguage="vb" debug="true" />
 
    <!--  CUSTOM ERROR MESSAGES
          Set customErrors mode="On" or "RemoteOnly" to enable custom error messages, "Off" to disable. 
          Add <error> tags for each of the errors you want to handle.
 
          "On" Always display custom (friendly) messages.
          "Off" Always display detailed ASP.NET error information.
          "RemoteOnly" Display custom (friendly) messages only to users not running 
           on the local Web server. This setting is recommended for security purposes, so 
           that you do not display application detail information to remote clients.
    -->
    <customErrors mode="RemoteOnly" defaultRedirect="whatwedo.htm" />
 
    <!--  AUTHENTICATION 
          This section sets the authentication policies of the application. Possible modes are "Windows", 
          "Forms", "Passport" and "None"
 
          "None" No authentication is performed. 
          "Windows" IIS performs authentication (Basic, Digest, or Integrated Windows) according to 
           its settings for the application. Anonymous access must be disabled in IIS. 
          "Forms" You provide a custom form (Web page) for users to enter their credentials, and then 
           you authenticate them in your application. A user credential token is stored in a cookie.
          "Passport" Authentication is performed via a centralized authentication service provided
           by Microsoft that offers a single logon and core profile services for member sites.
    -->
    <authentication mode="Windows" /> 
 
 
    <!--  AUTHORIZATION 
          This section sets the authorization policies of the application. You can allow or deny access
          to application resources by user or role. Wildcards: "*" mean everyone, "?" means anonymous 
          (unauthenticated) users.
    -->
    <authorization>
        <allow users="*" /> <!-- Allow all users -->
 
            <!--  <allow     users="[comma separated list of users]"
                             roles="[comma separated list of roles]"/>
                  <deny      users="[comma separated list of users]"
                             roles="[comma separated list of roles]"/>
            -->
    </authorization>
 
    <!--  APPLICATION-LEVEL TRACE LOGGING
          Application-level tracing enables trace log output for every page within an application. 
          Set trace enabled="true" to enable application trace logging.  If pageOutput="true", the
          trace information will be displayed at the bottom of each page.  Otherwise, you can view the 
          application trace log by browsing the "trace.axd" page from your web application
          root. 
    -->
    <trace enabled="false" requestLimit="10" pageOutput="false" traceMode="SortByTime" localOnly="true" />
 
 
    <!--  SESSION STATE SETTINGS
          By default ASP.NET uses cookies to identify which requests belong to a particular session. 
          If cookies are not available, a session can be tracked by adding a session identifier to the URL. 
          To disable cookies, set sessionState cookieless="true".
    -->
    <sessionState 
            mode="InProc"
            stateConnectionString="tcpip=127.0.0.1:42424"
            sqlConnectionString="data source=127.0.0.1;Trusted_Connection=yes"
            cookieless="false" 
            timeout="20" 
    />
 
    <!--  GLOBALIZATION
          This section sets the globalization settings of the application. 
    -->
    <globalization requestEncoding="utf-8" responseEncoding="utf-8" />
   
  </system.web>
 
</configuration>

[kleinma]

did you create an APPLICATION on the webserver for the folder that the aspx page is sitting in?

[rabid lemming]

Not sure if this is right but might be worth a try:

in you asp page use:

<%@ Page Language="VB" Debug="true" %>

You may want to contact your web host and ask then if their is any reason for such a problem

[gtilles]

no go... thx,
the hosting company is supposedly on it, I just wanted to see if perhaps there was something on my end-although it works fine on the other hosting company servers it seems like it is thier problem.

[kleinma]

again, did you create an application on IIS for the directory you FTP'd the files to? If you didn't that could cause your problem.

[gtilles]

I don't have access to the hosting server-I have ftp access only.
Unless they have a control panel for users, I don't follow what you mean by creating an application on IIS

[kleinma]

ASP.NET applications need to have an application created for them on IIS to run correctly...

If you don't have access to IIS on the server (which is usually the case with 3rd party hosts) then they generally offer a control panel where you can create/remove applications.

Here is what the IIS panel looks like. You should check and see in the control panel of the site if there is an option to do this.. its probably the problem. Most (if not all) hosts that offer ASP.NET, give you that functionality.

Don't you have IIS on your development machine?

[gtilles]

Of course I do-Any I've never had to do what your suggesting in order to make my pages work either on my local machine or or a 3rd party server.
But I'll call them and see.

[kleinma]

well when you create a new asp.net application in visual studio.. it does it for you... thats that whole dialog you get while its "creating the web application" or whatever it tells you when you create a new ASP.NET application

[mendhak]

Yes, but he doesn't have access to the host server. Which means you must create an application folder through a control panel that they provide which will create the IIS application folder for you. You cannot simply create a new ftp folder and put the files in there. Get it (get it? ha ha)?

[kleinma]

I know... I was just posting an IIS screen shot because posting a screenshot of my webhosts control panel wouldn't really help any

but I did mention above

If you don't have access to IIS on the server (which is usually the case with 3rd party hosts) then they generally offer a control panel where you can create/remove applications.

Here is what the IIS panel looks like. You should check and see in the control panel of the site if there is an option to do this.. its probably the problem. Most (if not all) hosts that offer ASP.NET, give you that functionality.

[gtilles]

I guess one point of confusion is I have two other hosting companies I use and all I did was ftp the files up and they worked no problem.
So apparently something is different in the way these companies have set up their servers.

[kleinma]

did you upload them right to the root of the site? or did you create folders for the individual tests you were doing?

Perhaps the other hosts have something in place to create an application for all folders?

[gtilles]

I uploaded the bin directory with the dll and the aspx page to the root.

[kleinma]

The root has an application on it by default (I think) If I am wrong then perhaps the host does it for you on the root.