Is Longhorn's IIS an Apache killer?

Anonymous:

"Is Longhorn's IIS an Apache killer?" No. Why even bother asking rhetorical questions with simple answers?

Keith:

My God, such a witty argument from you. There's really no reply I can make to such a well considered, convincing argument as yours.

Admin:

when IIS natively supports .htaccess ...well pigs will fly first won't they?

jusmon:

.htaccess? C'mon we've been using that crap for decades now, time to evolve. Can anyone say forms based authentication? Give it a looksie oh and uh yeah IIS7 supports it natively.

Metal:

Can anyone say swoon at the buzzwords? Now we have .net zealot to preach to all the other zealots.

Anonymous:

HTAccess incurrs a per-request performance hit. IIS provides better support with indivual config files that can lock down directories natively and they don't have per-request penalties associated with them.

If you really want to support slow htaccess files by default. IIS gives you the ability to write your own module to support them. That should appeal to all you *nix guys who like to do everything the hard way.

raindog:

Not even close!!!!

LAMP vs IIS + SQL cost the hardware required? Cost the development environment required? Cost the software licensing? Compare the application development labour costs?

Microsoft lost this battle long ago!

Jarrod Spiga:

Hardly any of your points are valid.

For starters, the only cost difference between LAMP and WIMP (What I like to call Windows, IIS, MySQL and PHP) is the cost of a Windows Server license for all those "non-enterprise users" (read, home users and business users who don't want to shell out for a formally supported Linux distro). MySQL is also free under Windows, as is PHP. The last time I also checked, a single license of Windows Server 2003 Standard is cheaper than any Enterprise Linux distro I've seen - and Web edition of Win2K3 is cheaper still.

As far as hardware costs goes, if you host a live website on a crappy P3 or Celeron server, it doesn't matter if you run Windows or Linux - Your hardware is not fault tolerant and you deserve the downtime you get. You don't need a super server just to run Windows Server - you need a super server to ensure that the hardware doesn't let you down.

Application development labour costs? Cost of the dev environment required? Again, the comment isn't valid because I'm yet to come across a Linux dev tool that can't be ported to Windows in one way or another. It takes me just as long to develop PHP scripts to run under Windows or Linux - especially since the same code works on both web servers.

So, get off your "Linux roolz" high-horse and actually come up wioth substantial arguments before writing something off. Instead, how about you think about using the right tool for the right job.

For the record, I personally manage 12 RHEL servers running LAMP and 4 Windows 2003 ones running WIMP (amongst the occasional ASP-related site) - and in general, I have just as many difficulties with LAMP as I do WIMP, if not more.

raindog:

Who is on a high horse! Yes MySQL PHP etc, have been ported to run under windows. But they will run for years between reboots under LA, not so under WI.

As for the crappy boxes comments do a check on just what many of the major hosting providers are using for budget to mid range server space. There are plenty of celerons and more than the occasional PIII servers still doing sterling service at the small business pricepoint. Whilst desirable high end hardware is far from essential for many websites, uptime on many these of these boxes you dismiss as rubbish is measured in years. Run IIS up with half a gig or less of RAM and see how you get on!

You run RHEL, I run Centos, woo-hoo big deal, the fact your running 12 nix boxes to 4 MS ones pretty much confirms my arguement, so maybe your the one on the high horse!

Why would a home or small business user be shelling out for an enterprise edition of RHEL? You don't need to go further than the phonebook to find good affordable LAMP support and there is plenty to choose from. The choice is there for the end user to select what fits, the myth that only MS boxes can be supported in a business environment is just that, a myth. What was it you said? right tool for the job or should all of last years exchange server hardware head to landfill rather than be pressed into sterling service as a functional and relaible web server.

Yes it takes just as long to develop PHP code on either platform which is a whole lot less problematic than messing with ASP and IIS and then trying to secure the final mess which is still where MS would prefer you be than running WIMP. I am far from a Linux fanboy and I am far from the only one to prefer LAMP for web applications. I use a combination of windows and nix tools for development but comes time to serve it up there is not a single area where IIS is ahead of apache.

Explain to me please Jarrod why MS is the right tool and then maybe we call tell those millions of home and small business users sucessfully running LAMP where they are all going wrong.

flanque:

raindog, take a step back for a minute and have a look at how you're behaving. You are acting like a child.


Jarrod's points are valid. Yours seem to be based more on fanboism and "I hate everything Microsoft". He also has a lot of experience.


The bottom line is that the TCO is what matters, including procurement of hardware and software, installation, support and on-going expenses (electricity, etc). You can check this out for yourself - time and time again there have been "reports" and "analysis papers" which clearly show that a Microsoft only environment can be on-par or even cheaper to "own" than alternative Linux options.


Now, I know you're gearing up to rebut everything line by line, but stop.. pause.. take a breath and try to see past the anti-Microsoft hype. Try to take a more top-down ownership and cost perspective.


It's an absurd suggestion that everyone who has a WIMP infrastructure are misguided and blinded by Microsoft's marketing. It makes one look uneducated when they claim that a WIMP solution will always be more expensive. The executives who sign off on the budgets for this infrastructure have a great many people to answer to for getting it wrong. They're driven by the most cost-effective option, many times a cost-cutting option. This will be based on many factors we cannot cover entirely here but include existing infrastructure, existing skill base, existing code base, licensing, vendor support costs, future scope provisions and on-demand support.

What do you do when you have a PHP coding issue which is causing a critical business application to fail and every minute costs hundreds or thousands of dollars in downtime? What do you do when "something is broken" but you're not sure which component is broken? Websites, forums, newsgroups and FAQ's have their place for guidance but can they be seriously taken as a professional support avenue? For me and many organisations the answer is no.


Does this mean that WIMP is THE only way to go? No, that's equally absurd to suggest. What it means is that for some situations a LAMP set up is the way to go, and for others a WIMP set up is the way to go.


And keep in mind there will be organisations where Microsoft does convince them when they probably shouldn't, but at the same time one does have to raise serious questions over the suggestion that LAMP set ups are "free" and just how many people take it for granted that it ends there.

raindog:

I apologise if my arguement was interpreted as childish it was not my intention. I fully recognise the consequences of a failed project in a corporate environment and know exactly whose ass will be on the line should such an event occur.
You cite an example of what will happen if a PHP project's errors create costly failures, and I'd suggest it is no different to what happens with a failure in a MS only environment. The big difference, (and its the cloak of scoundrels and incompetants) is you can pull the "the error is within windows and they're working on it" card and absolve at least part of the responsibility.
The arguement right tool for the job was suggested and for the majority of web server applications that tool will not be a MS one. This is not just my opinionated ranting you only have to take a broad look at whats out there to substantiate this arguement.
If TCO is less for Microsoft Web servers why are the generally offered at a cost premium by hosting providers, given it is a very competitive environment? My cynical side would suggest its because a great many IT professionals are so MS centric and entrenched with a safety first attitude that they can be made to pay a premium. I dont believe this but there is a more than modicum of truth to it.
Yes in many inhouse IT environments it can be advantagous to maintain an all MS policy but when Web solutions are mostly outsourced or handled by a specialist team the TCO arguements are not as weighted towards lets keep it all MS.
The enterprise IT space is conservative and for the most part that's a good thing, management doesn't look kindly on failures and will not take kindly to any suggestions involving risk. However the IT staffer that can display his aptitude, pressing some of the old hardware that Jarrod so despises, into service as revenue creating systems, will be the staffer that will not go unnoticed from above.
I take offence to being branded a fanboy for suggesting a Linux solution is better for a particular application. I am not one of the many here suggesting linux for all, far from it. I can recognise a product for its relative merits and its suitability in a given environment, that's experience! Fanboys are the ones that suggest Linux desptops for all without consideration, or those that think MACs are virus immune or the many that truly believe each new release of Windows deserves a lather of excitement.
I can accept differing viewpoint without attacking the author or applying labels and I'd thank you to pay me the same courtesy.

jusmon:

It's funny the "Is windows going to crush linux or vice versa" argument is always a great troll for the diehard zealots. After all these years you'd think these guys would accept each has it's advantage and disadvantage. I'm a big fan of WIMP myself and have run LAMP for years. My only comment is check out the new work being done by the IIS team at Microsoft and Zend regarding PHP and FastCGI. It may not make IIS the killer app this article claims but it's still pretty damn bad ass. Oh and uh last time I checked PHP ran just fine on Windows, it's the crap single threaded extensions being distributed that's causing all the havok.

Wake up fellas neither IIS or Apache is going away any time soon and both are getting better. I would take a fair and unbiased look at the whole .net thing though. I haven't seen too many PHP apps get converted to windows apps and then back to web apps with such minimal effort as is done in .net. Oh and just for the record, interpreted code like PHP & ASP is just so 1980. Get with the times fella and evolve already, can anyone say DOT NET?

Debiant1:

People who are already using apatche under *nix probably wont care or change. They are as intrenched as the average PC user is with XP. Microsoft are unlikely to woo these people, and they consist of some fairly big players. Even if they gave server and IIS away for free.

However for the smaller users, and particularly those running apatche on windows, it might be different. Windows has the advantage here becasue its familiar and *easier* to setup and configure.

My 2 cents

Anonymous:

you are funny. Linux techies are way too costly

raindog:

maybe you are confusing techies with treckies! Choose the better techies and you dont even have to wear the cost burdon of providing tinfoil hats, further cost savings...

Anonymous:

Cost and availability of staff to run Linux and Windows servers varies by area. Locally, you can't hire a Linux tech. There aren't any. Those of us who run Linux boxes are also running Windows boxes.

Also keep in mind, not all web platforms are run on hosting company systems. Many of them are intra- or extra- nets, and Linux doesn't make sense when you run a Windows network anyway.

There are valid reasons to run a Windows web server. There are valid reasons to run a Linux web server. Fortunately the choice is rarely made by zealots on either side of the argument.

tin:

With all those options, let's hope the defaults are sane...

Anonymous:

As far as defaults go they are:

1) Features are not installed by default
2) Safe by default

I've already seen more 'complaints' that features don't work than I can shake a stick at. It always turns out that the feature works fine - it just wasn't installed yet. Module bits don't even exist on the box until you tell them to be.

If anything, it will take administrators a while to figure out that IIS administration is off by default, but very easy to automate. As the article says, you can just copy your config from one server to the other and start up the server, assuming you have administrative rights to %system%\system32\inetsrv\config.

Even delegation is a secure matter. Users cannot override settings in their individual application config files until you give them permission to do so. This can be controlled down to an attribute level or an element level. You can even lock down the ability to add or remove elements from collections that were added further up the delegation chain.

Its slick stuff. I can't wait for longhorn to come out so I can migrate.

Anonymous:

Is Longhorn Server's IIS any different from Vista's IIS?

iisguy:

IIS 7 in Vista lets you develop applications that can use the new integrated pipeline, extensible UI, microsoft.web.administration API and other extensiblitity points. These will run on Longhorn. Expect to see some features in IIS 7 on Longhorn that are not in Vista since it is a server OS vs a client OS. However, that will not effect your ability to develop applications on Vista that leverage the new architecture.
-brett hill

jusmon:

Longhorn's IIS is still very much beta and still being developed as is longhorn. Vista's IIS is based off the same code but an earlier version. If that makes sense.

Simon:

Well I have to say that the company that I work for which has many of the leading websites in the industry that it is in uses both Apache and IIS --we've also are testing and following IIS7. We also use MySQL and MSSQL.

1st.

I personally love apache; however, I am somewhat limited. PHP, to me now is a thing of the past. I and most of the programmers that work with me moved away from it because of the rapid app development that we can get from .Net. Also, .Net is much more flexible and allows us to do things that would take mountains of code in php.

The management of IIS is now very getting easy and with the changes we can replicate settings with ease. Also, the error trapping and handling is sensational.

When it comes to hacks, we've found the latest build of IIS to be virtually solid. I do not beleive MS has even released a patch for IIS6 directly since its launch (unlike other web servers).

We have not had to reboot the servers (linux and Windows) for over a year and even when we would need to our servers are load balanced in a web farm and virtualized so it does not make a difference to the user. This is called planning and my CTO takes all of these factors in to account when planning implementation --maybe other should think like this too.

Cost. MS wins on this point. 1. ease of use, ease of installation, ease of maintainace, ease of deployment, ease of resortation. Note that I mention ease as the highest cost is not licences, it is the cost of manpower. The cost of IT manpower pales in comparison to the cost of server software and licences. So with .Net rapid development, the ease of replication and deployment of IIS, the costs are minimal. The cost of Linux on an enterprise level is costly (to delpoy and maintain)

raindog:

So if where you work they all have blue hats,it is obvious that where everyone works they must have blue hats too?
If I do the sums, I come up with an entirely different cost model and I would hazard a guess the same would be true for the great majority of small and medium businesses.
Labels like corporate or enterprise are a broad brush covering a variety of sins.
Reliability you achieve with a web farm of load balanced servers may well upset the TCO balance for the web presence of a national charity or company with a smaller workforce, and no outsourcing is not always the answer in those cases.
Given the interest in the topic, perhaps there is an oportunity for an independant APC article comparing detailed web infrastructure TCO at different levels of business? Just a thought.

raindog:

Unless of course producing a an unbiased across the board report was to be advertiser unfriendly.....

Anonymous:

Well it's not so much Apache vs IIS as you can run Apache on Windows or Linux.

Personally I prefer linux and thus Apache. Apache has its sweet points and so does IIS. One thing I like about Linux is their seems to be some more light weight web servers comming out.

So for me and my company we just have way fewer problems with all linux boxes in general and thus stick with Apache and linux. We even run coldfusion off our linux boxes all running Debian.

As for the person saying linux techies are to much they do not understand what they are buying. After we switched out almost all of our windows boxes for linux I was able to reduce staff. In the end, for my situation, it seemed to take around 33%+ more people for windows then linux. I pay the linux guys 20% more and I get a 13% profit. Then you add medicare social security, benifits and all that jazz I actually save even more. With the extra time we got by switching to Linux I turned the I.T. Department into more a development department. We have developed more applications than ever before all the while having less staff....

Kalle Stenqvist:

Jag hoppas du läser kommentarerna som dina artiklar genererar.

Hälsningar

Kalle S

Eddy:

I work in an enviroment where we have hundreds of linux box's and have probably a good 80 or so windows box's.

Our managment team love opensource and hence forth we try move everything across to linux (RHE_4) in a effort to save money.

They learnt the hard way however as the TCO is now higher as expertise needed to manage LAMP style enviroments costs more as its far harder to administer with a simple command line option having the possibility of bringing down a enviroment.

Once wage/support is added it actually cost us more.
Some of our newer enviroments are even worse - Moodle and jumla used on a box means a totally unsupported content delivery platform - fantastic!

Anonymous:

Before I tell you that you're all wrong headed about this, I have to let you know this. I have been doing open source development professionally for 8 years. I prefer the BSDs over Linux, but that is a superficiality. I've built ISP's from the ground up on Linux. I've made a respectable living with LAMP for a long time. Fast forward to 2005. .NET 2.0 enters the scene. I hip it. Holy crap! What an beatifully concieved, power tool set for architecting elegant and scalable software. The point that you guys are missing is this: C# is a real programming language. PHP is a loosely-typed spagetti machine. Its object model is half-baked. Developer that espouse and evangelize it are generally noobs who don't fully grok the lay of the land in the enterprise space. While LAMP and for that matter WAMP have been good to me over the years, I cannot deny that this solution set is inferior to the MS offerings. That said, it comes down to this. Those of you who don't want to pay for software shouldn't. Let the companies that you work for do it. Its targeted at business. MS has recognized that the price has been an impediment for attracting new developers to adopt is technologies. Thus, they now give away express versions of their SQL server and IDE products. For those of you who are foaming at the mouth to rhetorically trounce me for selling out, I have this to say. Part of maturing as a developer and growing yourself into higher paying jobs, comes by recognizing and adopting newer better ways of accomplishing the things you need to do as a programmer. The fundamental fact is that evil as you may think they are, MS plays the big boy game, while you PHP choaders are picking up the scraps around the edges with your little pure http db apps. This class of app is legacy and cute at best. At worst they're brittle, clunky, and very insecure. So anyone for another helping crow..?

Newbie:

I agree with you.

Regarding the topic, IIS7.....Apache?

I think the absolute answer will be YES. IIS is way toooooooo far secured than Apache. IIS is way too powerful. It can serve PHP; Can apache serve ASP.NET page? Nah.
Security, how many versions of apache do we have now (Apache.major.minor.family.release) compared to iis (IIS.major.minor)? This is due to the fact that apache web server has swarm of ants. He he. And the fact that among webservers being hacked, say previous years, thousands or millions of servers were running apache, due to security flaw in some components for serving web.

Soon, when MS releases "Core" with IIS7, it will definitely rock!! I am not a fan of Microsoft, but i like their products. Let's admit the fact that 99% of us, are using MS Products.

As for apache web server, porting windows-based app is an option, say ASP.NET and MS SQL Server 20xx running under apache web server on posix-based system...Cute.

The previous years, I love apache...

echo "Your apache hates me" >> /etc/motd

Well, just my thought.

tracyanne:

quote:: Can apache serve ASP.NET page? ::quote

Yes.

Mariano:

I don't consider myself a fanboy. I develop web applications for a living, and use LAMP and WIMP, and WISA? (Windows, IIS, SQL Server, ASP.NET). I enjoy working with all of them.
I used to think it was way cheaper to get a LAMP installation going, but lately, there's been a lot of great FREE tools released by MS that have made my life so much easier.
I only had to pay for a Windows license. Then I downloaded Visual Web Developer Express and SQL Server 2005 Express, both free. They are amazing. SQL Express is really, really powerful. And, the day I have to upgrade that to a Professional version, is the day my company's doing so good I'll be a millionaire. For all other purposes, the Express edition is way more than I'll ever need.

Ivan:

Wow, finally someone who thinks the way I do... I believe both MS and Linux have their spaces... but there is a time when we as developers need to mature and look at things objectively. What is the better tool for the job, not just your opinion or bias, but what is better for the company and the bottom line. Ease of use is huge, ease of development is even bigger. Labor is where most of the money goes and if it takes you a month to develop something on PHP that takes me a week to develop on .Net, you know I'm going to go the .Net route, plain and simple. A wise professor once told me to not reinvent the wheel. If its already been invented, use it! I've used it all, MySQL, MSSQL, PHP, Coldfusion, ASP, VB, VB.Net, C#, etc... I choose to use the wheel thats been invented to build the car that my company is asking me to build.

Xaverine:

.net 2.0 and 3.0 have really impressed me which I couldnt say a few years back!
the team that builds enterprise library deserve the credits as well ..
all of which really takes development of enterprise solutions less time consuming and complicated!!

now i just wish MS can imbrace Linux and make .net platform-independent! somehow I dont think the mono guys can keep up with .net framework's progress while maintaining the quality. But still bless them for trying!

Jonathan Abbey:

Everyone seems to insist on comparing ASP.NET to PHP, rather than the variety of advanced web frameworks available for use with Java, either on Windows or on Linux.

Anonymous:

"Apache killer"? C'mon.
What would you think of the editor/writer if you opened the business section of the newspaper and saw the headline:
"Delta, US Airways merger an American killer"
or the food section and saw:
"New healthy sides for hot dogs a kraut killer"
?

Anonymous:

It isn't going to kill Apache, IIS6 didn't, IIS7 won't either.

There seems to be a lot of stuff taken or adapted from the way Apache works. Apache is also totally modular, can be edited using a single file which could be split up in multiple files for easier development.

The arguments in this article are thus false that it is a 'good' point for IIS as if Apache doesn't have this. Apache had the same features long ago (since the beginning). This article isn't comparing the two either, it's just giving an overview and the author seems to be just a Microsoft marketing shill rather than an honest software reviewer.

Apache is still cheaper and has proven stable compared to this, IIS7 has yet to come out in unproven server-software, and the industry doesn't jump easily to a new unproven solution.

As a sysadmin with a nice track record of hosting solutions in both Windows and Linux, I can tell you, until now, Windows has always been a hell to manage (especially remotely through dial-up for example when you're on call with the cell phone attached to your laptop) compared to the simple syntax in standard text files most Linux services use.

It seems that Microsoft is on the good way (they finally got it?) but it's going to be a long road to reach the stability and cost efficiency of a well-managed Linux or BSD-based solution.

Pi (New user):

Security and benchmarks are very relevant for servers, hence the $1.5bn spent by Microsoft to crunch Apache.

But, as usual, MSFT does it its special way: "if you can't beat them -make them fail":

Apache and all other web servers are now immensely slower than Microsoft IIS 6/7.

This is due to the fact that Microsoft nested IIS into the Windows (locked) kernel, where it can grab all the non-paged memory and CPU resources to work faster than Windows applications.

It could not have happened under Linux because the Linux user-mode overhead is 6x smaller than the Windows user-mode overhead (making Linux kernel-mode servers less attractive in terms of performances).

But there is a price to pay for kernel-mode performances: security. And MSFT documented years ago what happens with Windows kernel-drivers and why it was so unsafe -until now, when we are told by "experts" that IIS 7.0 is safer than Apache!

The whole story, with Apache, Nginx, Cherokee, Rock, IIS 5.1 and IIS 7.0 plus TrustLeap G-WAN benchmarks:

http://www.gwan.com/

For the first time, a user-mode web server is beating IIS in the kernel.