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Can't see path to another server in ASP.NET MVC

I have an internal ASP.NET MVC site that needs to read an Excel file. The file is on a different server from the one that ASP.NET MVC is running on and in order to prevent access problems I'm trying to copy it to the ASP.NET MVC server.
It works OK on my dev machine but when it is deployed to the server it can't see the path.
This is the chopped down code from the model (C#):
string fPath = HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath(#"/virtualdir");
string fName = fPath + "test.xlsm";
if (System.IO.File.Exists(fName))
{
// Copy the file and do what's necessary
}
else
{
if (!Directory.Exists(fPath))
throw new Exception($"Directory not found: {fPath} ");
else
throw new Exception($"File not found: {fName } ");
}
The error I'm getting is
Directory not found:
followed by the path.
The path in the error is correct - I've copied and pasted it into explorer and it resolves OK.
I've tried using the full UNC path, a mapped network drive and a virtual directory (as in the code above). Where required these were given network admin rights (to test only!) but still nothing has worked.
The internal website is using pass through authentication but I've used specific credentials with full admin rights for the virtual directory, and the virtual dir in IIS expands OK to the required folder.
I've also tried giving the application pool (which runs in Integrated mode) full network admin rights.
I'm kind of hoping I've just overlooked something simple and this isn't a 'security feature'.
I found this question copy files between servers asp.net mvc but the answer was to use FTP and I don't want to go down that route if I can avoid it.
Any assistance will be much appreciated.

First, To be on the safe side that your directory is building correctly, I would use the Path.Combine.
string fName = Path.Combine(fPath, "test.xlsm")
Second, I would check the following post and try some things there as it seems to be a similar issue.
Directory.Exists not working for a network path
If you are still not able to see the directory, there is a good chance the user does not have access to that network path. Likely what happened is the app pool running your application has access to the directory on the server. The production box likely doesn't have that same access. You would have to get with the network engineer to get that resolved.
Alternatively, you could write a Powershell script to run as a user who has access to both the production and the development server to copy the file over to the production server if that is your ultimate goal and your server administrators could schedule it for you if that is allowed in your environment.

How do I remotely access self-hosted Nancy service?

I am creating a simple Windows service that hosts a Nancy instance to provide views of its internal data. Everything works as expected when using a browser on the local machine; I see the view that it serves up. However, I cannot find any reason why it will not access from a remote browser (on the same network). Access from a remote browser simply delays a while; IE will eventually display "This page can’t be displayed;" Safari on an iPad shows the partial progress bar for a while and does nothing.
I'm binding using all local IPs, not just localhost.
I am using the GetUriParams() function at this link to discover all local IP addresses for binding. http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/694907/Embed-a-web-server-in-a-windows-service
_nancyHost = new NancyHost(GetUriParams(port));
_nancyHost.Start();
I discovered at this page that binding to localhost works for local access only. http://forums.asp.net/t/1881253.aspx?More+SelfHost+Documentation
The IPs that this function discovers are for Ethernet adapter, Wireless adapter, and two VMware Network adapters from a prior installation of a VMware player. I've tried the remote access both by machine name and by literal IP to the Ethernet adapter.
I added entries to urlacl list.
I have used the netsh http add urlacl command as recommended in many places, including at this link: Remote access to a Nancy Self Host
If I perform netsh http show urlacl, I see the entry for the port I'm using.
I tried different Nancy configs
If I set the Nancy configuration option for UrlReservations.CreateAutomatically, I will get security prompts, which after allowing, I see new entries in netsh http show urlacl list output for all of the local IPs, but it still does not allow remote access. I also tried the RewriteLocalHost option true and false.
I've tried starting Nancy with http://+:3684 or http://*:3684 (which gets parsing exception from Uri()) and with http://0.0.0.0:3684 (which gets exception from AddAllPrefixes() within HttpListener()).
I added the EXE to Windows firewall
I have created firewall exceptions as described here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms733768.aspx
The associated rule shows Private,Public and "Any" for every column with both TCP and UDP.
I tried running Nancy in different environments. I've run the code in: the Windows Service running as Local System, a console app within Visual Studio 2013 debugger, and the console app Run As Administrator.
I imagine it's a simple security setting, but I've googled and searched and tried various things for a couple of days now.
What am I missing?

This answer provided the clue I needed.
https://stackoverflow.com/a/21364604/1139376
This is because HttpListener is built on top of http.sys which will listen on the port you specified on behalf of your program.
It wasn't my EXE doing the actual listening. All I needed to do was to add an Incoming rule to the Windows Firewall set for the "System" program and the specific TCP port I'm using. That allowed remote access.

Use the HostConfiguration and let Nancy make the URL reservations automaticaly for you.
var config = new HostConfiguration
{
RewriteLocalhost = true,
UrlReservations = new UrlReservations { CreateAutomatically = true }
};
host = new NancyHost(new Uri("http://localhost:8080"), new DefaultNancyBootstrapper(), config);
host.Start();
Note that this will force ACL to create network rules for new ports if they do not already exist.

Adding a website to IIS7 on remote machine C#

I currently have an application written in C# that adds a website to IIS7 on the current machine and it works perfectly, the code is as follows
var iisManager = new ServerManager();
var sites = iisManager.Sites;
var site = sites.Add("WebsiteName", "C:\Website", 80);
var application = site.Applications[0];
application.ApplicationPoolName = appPool;
iisManager.CommitChanges();
I have to create a version of this code that will add a website to IIS on a remote machine located on the same network. That code is as follows.
var iisManager= ServerManager.OpenRemote("machineName"); //I've also tried machines IP
var sites = iisManager.Sites["Default Web Site"];
var site = Sites.Applications.Add("WebsiteName", "C:\Website", 80);
site.ApplicationPoolName = appPool;
iisManager.CommitChanges();
When machineName is the machine executing the code, it adds the website to IIS. However when machineName is the remote machine, I get the following exception
Retrieving the COM class factory for remote component with CLSID {2B72138B-3F5E-4502-8052-803546CE3364} from "remote machine name" failed due to the following error: 80070005 "remote machine"
The exception occurs when executing
var iisManager= ServerManager.OpenRemote("machineName");
Before executing the above code I use impersonation to impersonate an Administrator.
I can remote into the machine and even create a file on the machine using C# code.
I assume there is an issue with permissions on the remote machine or it could be because it's a VM, I'm really not sure.
The code 80070005, is fairly general and represents restricted access but I don't understand why considering I am impersonating an Admin.
I am executing the code on a Windows 7 sp1 x64 machine and the remote VM is running Windows Server 2008 sp2 x64.
If anyone has any ideas how to fix this issue or another way to add a website to IIS on a remote machine, I'd love to hear them.
Thanks

First of all you run your visual studio as administrator and OFF windows firewall of server then see it will work for Remote server

.Net's Directory Services throws a strange exception

I have a small C# solution used to check users credentials. It works fine for two of my teammates, but on my PC I get an exception.
The relevant code:
PrincipalContext context = new PrincipalContext(ContextType.Domain);
if (context.ValidateCredentials(System.Environment.UserDomainName + "\\" + usr, pwd))
return true;
else
return false;
And the exception is:
DirectoryOperationException, "The server cannot handle directory requests.".
I tried creating context with the explicit server name and the 636 port number, but this didn't help as well.
Any ideas?

I had this problem too using IIS Express and VS 2010. What fixed it for me was a comment on another thread.
Validate a username and password against Active Directory?
but i'll save you the click and search... :) Just add ContextOpations.Negotiate to you Validate Credentials call like below.
bool valid = context.ValidateCredentials(user, pass, ***ContextOptions.Negotiate***);

I had this issue: things were working on my dev machine but didn't work on the server. Turned out that IIS on the server was set up to run as LocalMachine. I changed it to NetworkService (the default) and things started working.
So basically check the user of the app pool if this is running on IIS.

I had to just create a new app pool and assign it .NET 2.0, then assign the new app pool to our web app, and it started working. We had .NET 3.5 SP2, so the hotfix wasn't ideal for us. Since the WWW service is usually Local System, I questioned that too. But since it was .NET and security related, I gave a shot at the app pool first and it worked.

Perhaps you need the hotfix?
FIX: DirectoryOperationException exception
And you are an Admin or the id that your service is running under is an Admin on your PC right?
I take it you already looked into this:
System.DirectoryServices.Protocols
"You may receive a less than helpful DirectoryOperationException(“The server cannot handle directory requests.”) what isn’t quite so amusing about this is that it didn’t even try to communicate with the server. The solution was to add the port number to the server. So instead of passing “Server” to open the LdapConnection, I passed “server:636”. By the way, LDAPS is port 636 – rather than the 389 port used by LDAP."
Good point, I wouldn't expect that Win7/.NET 3.5 would need that patch. How about the info provided in this question:
Setting user's password via System.DirectoryServices.Protocols in AD 2008 R2

How to programmatically connect to IIS 7

I am trying to connect to IIS programmatically. I find there are a ton of examples online, but I can't seem to get any to work and have tried quite a few variations
Every time I try the following code the object that is returned has this error for each property: ..."threw an exception of type 'System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException'"
using System.DirectoryServices;
String serverName = "serverName";
DirectoryEntry IIS = new DirectoryEntry("IIS://" + serverName + "/W3SVC");
IIS = new DirectoryEntry("IIS://" + serverName + "/W3SVC", "administrator", "mypassword");
IIS = new DirectoryEntry("IIS://" + serverName + "/W3SVC/1/ROOT", "administrator", "mypassword");
I am using Windows Directory user accounts and I have a bunch of sites running on IIS. I am trying this code on a windows xp development machine trying to connect to a windows 2008 Server with IIS 7. Anyone know what I am doing wrong?

Your account may not have launch permissions on the COM object wrapping the IIS calls. You may need to try adding yourself to the admin group on the box hosting IIS to get this to work.

Make sure you have the IIS6 management compatibility feature installed on the target server- you can't do remote management via ADSI on IIS7 without it.

Make sure that IIS is installed on your client machine - your program will throw a System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException if it isn't installed.
This counts when you are looking at IIS on a remote machine too, the machine running your app will need IIS too.
EDIT: Also, I've recently discovered an assembly specifically for connecting to and configuring IIS7 - Microsoft.Web.Administration. Might be worth looking at whether you have access to this (or can get access, it should be on the machine with IIS7 in any case) and see what it can do. I'm afraid I've not used it myself, so I can't tell you if it'll do what you want, but it's another option to look into.
Finally, there's the option of System.Management and WMI scripts.
Dim scope As New Management.ManagementScope("\\" & server & "\root\MicrosoftIISv2")
scope.Connect()
Dim query As New Management.ObjectQuery("select * from IISWebVirtualDirSetting")
Dim searcher As New Management.ManagementObjectSearcher(scope, query)
For Each obj As Management.ManagementObject In searcher.Get()
DoSomethingWith(obj)
Next
The list of properties on obj is at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms525005.aspx, there's also some more different queries you can run - just dig around on MSDN for more.