Can't get IIS Express 8 beta to run website as 64-bit process

Question

on x64 Windows 7 I am trying to get hello world MVC 3 website running as 64-bit process (so Environment.Is64BitProcess returns true on a page) using IIS Express 8 latest bet

Answer 1

Do the following to run VS2012 project in x64 project in IIS8 Express on x64. I am running x64 WCF service. See below,

• Install x64 version of IIS Express 8.

• Set the project to run x64 bit.

• Add a custom web server url. Because you don't want to start the service when the project run (F5).

- Write a bat file and add the following. Put the correct unc location of the applicationhost.config and the correct project name. Save the bat file.

cd "Program Files"/IIS Express 
iisexpress.exe  /config:"\\companyname.com\root\User-Profiles\testusername\Documents\IISExpress\config\applicationhost.config" /site:"YourProjectName.WcfHost" /apppool:"Clr4IntegratedAppPool"

• Run (F5) the project.
• Double click the bat file to start IIS Express 8 for x64. See Windows Task Manager and IIS Express system tray.

Answer 2

In order to solve this on my system, I cheated -- I copied the 64-bit executables (in \Program Files\IIS Express\) over the 32-bit executables (in \Program Files (x86)\IIS Express\). Visual Studio doesn't seem to care whether it's one or the other.

I guess we will have to wait and see if the final release of VS 2012 will allow for choosing between the 32-bit and 64-bit IIS Express.

Answer 3

You have to launch iisexpress from command line in this case,

http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/870/running-iis-express-from-the-command-line/

As I am not sure when will Microsoft updates the VS integration part to allow you to choose x64 IIS Express. The current integration obviously is x86 only.

Answer 4

In the registry, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\IISExpress\8.0\InstallPath and change the path to the 64-bit iisexpress.exe location.

Answer 5

It seems that creating EXE that does nothing else but start 64-bit IIS and putting it in place of 32-bit iisexpress.exe does the job.

This is C# code I used to create the EXE:

using System.Diagnostics;

namespace IISExpress64
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main( string[] args )
        {
            Process.Start( @"C:\Program Files\IIS Express\iisexpress.exe", string.Join( " ", args ) );
        }
    }
}

Answer 6

You can run IIS Express in 64 bit mode from the command line, and then use VS "attach to process" to debug.
See this question.
Have fun.