404 errors on downloading files

We have many different files on our server ".dat", ".exe", ".template"
plus other custom file extensions.

All these files on IIS6 (Windows 2003) seem to give a 404 when trying
to download them.

We have the folder set to "None" execute permissions and it is set for
"Read" permissions.

Is it true that we *have* to add a mime-type for every file extension
we wish to allow to download?

Surely it cant be true, that would be a nightmare to configure on every
folder on every site on every server (we have ordered 3) ... and for
absolutely no benefit whatsoever?

Please can somone confirm or correct me. Thanks

Re: 404 errors on downloading files

Yes, you need to define mime types.
IIS 6.0 does not serve unknown MIME types
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=326965

--
Regards,
Bernard Cheah
http://www.iis.net/
http://www.iis-resources.com/
http://msmvps.com/blogs/bernard/


"Coderanger" wrote in message
news:1152811932.217616.204600@i42g2000cwa.googlegroups.com.. .
> We have many different files on our server ".dat", ".exe", ".template"
> plus other custom file extensions.
>
> All these files on IIS6 (Windows 2003) seem to give a 404 when trying
> to download them.
>
> We have the folder set to "None" execute permissions and it is set for
> "Read" permissions.
>
> Is it true that we *have* to add a mime-type for every file extension
> we wish to allow to download?
>
> Surely it cant be true, that would be a nightmare to configure on every
> folder on every site on every server (we have ordered 3) ... and for
> absolutely no benefit whatsoever?
>
> Please can somone confirm or correct me. Thanks
>

Re: 404 errors on downloading files

Hi Coderanger,

I just want to address your "and for no benefit" comment. There definitely
is a benefit. This feature was added to IIS 6 to improve security.
Specifically, this is a defense against unintentionally serving out script
source files.

Consider the scenario where you install some script processor. For
illustration, I'll use ASP.NET, but the same thing applies to anything that
uses script mappings. Let's say you've got ASP.NET and create some content.
The script mechanism works by assigning requests with ".aspx" file
extensions to aspnet_isapi.dll. Now, for some reason, you decide to
uninstall ASP.NET. This will remove aspnet_isapi.dll and the script
mapping, but will not delete user created files. At this point, you've
potentially got .aspx files in your content directories. If IIS served
files for which there is no MIME mapping, those .aspx files would just be
returned raw to any requests for them. Since IIS 6 does not server static
files with no MIME mapping, this will not happen.

If you don't need this extra level of security, then you can just follow the
steps in the article that Bernard posted below and you will get the IIS 5
behavior.

Thank you,
-Wade A. Hilmo,
-Microsoft

"Bernard Cheah [MVP]" wrote in message
news:Ov8HGNwpGHA.4760@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
> Yes, you need to define mime types.
> IIS 6.0 does not serve unknown MIME types
> http://support.microsoft.com/?id=326965
>
> --
> Regards,
> Bernard Cheah
> http://www.iis.net/
> http://www.iis-resources.com/
> http://msmvps.com/blogs/bernard/
>
>
> "Coderanger" wrote in message
> news:1152811932.217616.204600@i42g2000cwa.googlegroups.com.. .
> > We have many different files on our server ".dat", ".exe", ".template"
> > plus other custom file extensions.
> >
> > All these files on IIS6 (Windows 2003) seem to give a 404 when trying
> > to download them.
> >
> > We have the folder set to "None" execute permissions and it is set for
> > "Read" permissions.
> >
> > Is it true that we *have* to add a mime-type for every file extension
> > we wish to allow to download?
> >
> > Surely it cant be true, that would be a nightmare to configure on every
> > folder on every site on every server (we have ordered 3) ... and for
> > absolutely no benefit whatsoever?
> >
> > Please can somone confirm or correct me. Thanks
> >
>
>

Re: 404 errors on downloading files

Coderanger wrote on 13 Jul 2006 10:32:12 -0700:

> We have many different files on our server ".dat", ".exe", ".template"
> plus other custom file extensions.
>
> All these files on IIS6 (Windows 2003) seem to give a 404 when trying
> to download them.
>
> We have the folder set to "None" execute permissions and it is set for
> "Read" permissions.
>
> Is it true that we *have* to add a mime-type for every file extension
> we wish to allow to download?
>
> Surely it cant be true, that would be a nightmare to configure on every
> folder on every site on every server (we have ordered 3) ... and for
> absolutely no benefit whatsoever?
>
> Please can somone confirm or correct me. Thanks

You do need to add the MIME type, but it's a global setting. You only need
to define each type once. Or you could follow the instructions in the link
posted by Bernard and add the wildcard mapping to enable all file
extensions.

Dan