VS2012 ASP.Net error message unable to connect to the configured development web server

Question

I bought a new Windows 8 PC last week.

First I installed VS 2010 on it but then that wasn't working properly so I uninstalled VS 2010 and then installed VS 2012 professional edition and SQL Server 2012.

Now I am able to create Windows applications but I am not able to run even a simple ASP.Net website.

When I try to view Default.aspx in browser it throws an error message that

Unable to connect to the configured development web server

so then I went into Add or remove components and installed IIS. but I still get that error message.

Even if I try to save the website at a folder location, the ASP.Net development server is not able to run the web page.

I get the same error message using either IIS or ASP.Net development server.

I am wondering is it Windows 8 security related issue?

How can I make sure my ASP.net Development server was installed correctly and has the appropriate permissions to run?

Does ASP.net work with regular Windows 8? or do I need Windows 8 pro? Microsoft's website doesn't say anything about it so am assuming Windows 8 should work because the Windows forms application works.

Please advise. I just want to be able to run a simple ASP.Net application to verify the installation.

I tried http://forums.asp.net/t/1768992.aspx/1 but that didn't work in this case.

Answer 1

ASP.NET IIS Registration Tool (Aspnet_regiis.exe) would be one of my suggestions along with checking what identity is the Application Pool in IIS using as it may have limited permissions. Last but not least, run Visual Studio as an Administrator so you don't have UAC issues.

Answer 2

All right. I had this problem for a week and I have tried many solutions. Finally, the following procedure will fix the problem.

I have set the Firewall system manually. This means that, at the time of communication by programs Firewall notify me. Incorrectly linked to "devenv.exe" was blocked by the Firewall. Correct mode of communication "devenv.exe" will solve the problem. "devenv.exe" is located in the following path.

"C: \\ Program Files (x86) \\ Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0 \\ Common7 \\ IDE \\ devenv.exe"

Devenv lets you set various options for the integrated development environment (IDE), and also build, debug, and deploy projects, from the command line.

Enjoy...

Answer 3

I've run into the same general error message that you stated, but the details of my error included the following:

Unable to connect to the configured development Web server.

Failed to register URL “ http://10.10.7.209:53553/ “ for site “FooBarSite” application “/“. Error description: The format of the specified network name is invalid. (0x800704be)

The fix for me was to make changes to the applicationhost.config file located in C:\\Users\\Jed\\Documents\\IISExpress\\config

Specifically, I had to update the bindingInformation for the site so that the IP Address matched the IP Address of my development computer.

Instructions

1. Run ipconfig to determine the IP Address of your computer
2. Open C:\\Users\\Jed\\Documents\\IISExpress\\config\\applicationhost.config (in Notepad)
3. Scroll down to <sites> , then find the <site> that has the name of your project (in this example it was FooBarSite
4. Update the bindingInformation so the IP Address matches the IP Address that was determined in ipconfig

Example

<bindings>
 <binding protocol="http" bindingInformation="*:53553:localhost" />
 <binding protocol="http" bindingInformation="*:53553:10.10.7.209" /> 
 <!-- I had to change the IP Address from 10.10.7.209 to 10.10.7.214 -->
</bindings>