Application Pool in IIS

An Internet Information Services (IIS) application pool is a set of URLs that is routed to one or more worker processes. Application pools responsible for to isolate one or more applications into their own process. For example you have two different website like website-A and website-B and want to deploy on same server, then application pool isolate your website means website-A run on one application pool and website-B run on another application pool.

It provides a convenient way to administer a set of web sites and applications and their corresponding worker processes. Process boundaries separate each worker process; therefore, a web site or application in one application pool will not be affected by application issues in other application pools. Application pools significantly increase both the reliability and manageability of a Web infrastructure.

Create Application Pool in IIS

You can also create your own application pool with custom settings.

Key Points About Application Pool

1. Provides isolation between different web applications.

2. Every web application has individual worker process.

3. Improve manageability of web application.

4. Provides better performance.

Configuring the Application Pool

For configuring the application pool, you need to configure the following properties in application pool.

1. Recycling

2. Performance

3. Health

4. Identity

Application Pool Recycling

Recycling application pools option is available in IIS6, IIS7.x and IIS8. This is a process for recycling the work process (w3wp.exe) and the memory used by the web application. It’s good practice to recycle the worker process periodically since it keeps application running smoothly.

IIS 7.5 Setting for Application Pool recycling:

How Recycling Process initiates:

You need not to worry about the application performance while recycling process. This process is transparent from client. When IIS conduct recycling, it invokes a new worker process first, and then shut down the old worker process. In this way application request will be handle by the new worker process without downtime. This process is required high-availability of IIS.

Advantages of using IIS recycling feature

1. All the clients can connect to IIS server, and every requests will be handled without downtime.

2. There is no connection loss.

3. It is a faster operation than IISRESET to initialize system resource (memory).

IIS RESET

IIS RESET command stops all IIS services with its components. In fact, it does not kill any worker processes, and running components. Like any windows services, the command just sends a message – “Stop running as soon as possible” – to shutdown IIS services gracefully.

Disadvantage of IIS Reset

1. HTTP.SYS will lose existing client-connections after running IISRESET.

2. All incoming requests will need to establish new connections again.

3. Web browsers can’t connect the IIS server during restarting IIS means all requests will be missed.

4. A worker process can’t keep any data – cached objects & binaries

Different Type of Application Pool Available in IIS 7.0 and IIS 7.5

There are two types’ .NET integration modes for ASP.NET application, that identified that how IIS processes an incoming request to the sites, applications and web services that run in that application pool.

Integrated Mode

Integrated mode makes ASP.NET an integral part of IIS. Now the IIS server functionality is split into more than 40 modules that break the IIS and ASP.NET functionality into pieces. Modules such as StaticFileModule, BasicAuthenticationModule, FormsAuthentication, Session, Profile and RoleManager are part of the IIS pipeline. FormsAuthentication, Session, Profile and RoleManager were previously part of ASP.NET and didn't have anything to do with IIS.

Classic Mode

Classic mode models the IIS 6.0 model in which ASP.NET is an ISAPI add-on to IIS. This mode is available for backward compatibility but lacks many of the features in the new integrated mode. In Classic mode, IIS has its own pipeline that can only be extended by creating an ISAPI extension, which has a well-deserved reputation for being difficult to develop. ASP.NET is run as an ISAPI extension that is just one part of the IIS pipeline.

What do you think?

I hope now you have better understanding about Application Pool in IIS. Your valuable feedback, question, or comments about this article are always welcome.