What's the best way to get direct file access to files within the web directories from an ASP.NET application?

Question

My ASP.NET application logs transactions (both inside AND outside of databases), and therefore needs read/write access to text files within various directories within the root of the website - in ADDITION to the normal database access.

In this scenario, how can I safely allow my ASP.NET application to write data to the web folders? I have a thread-safe DLL that performs the actual work, so I don't believe I need to worry about multiple sessions writing to the log files at the exact same time - assuming my DLL will only be running in a single instance/process that will be shared between numerous ASP.NET instances/processes/threads.

But I'm more concerned about file access permissions. I've heard that ASP.NET applications generally aren't allowed access to the webserver's local file system, and that this may even restrict my DLL from getting the correct file access. Can I grant my application file-access to the web-driectories?

Answer 1

The best way to approach this is to allocate a special user and assign the AppPool your application is running from to be run under that user's credentials. You can then assign read/write rights to the folders and files you need using the new user credentials.