Full Removal of FrontPage Server Extensions from an IIS 3.0 Web Site Breaks All Sites

In a multihosted environment using Internet Information Server (IIS) 3.0, if you remove the FrontPage Server Extensions from a virtual site, other FrontPage virtual sites may be inoperable.

This condition occurs when you use the FrontPage stand-alone Microsoft Management Console (MMC) to do a full removal of the Server Extensions from a virtual site by clearing the Preserve web meta-information for a later upgrade or reinstall of the FrontPage Server Extensions check box.

When the FrontPage 2000 client attempts to open Webs on the other virtual sites where the Server Extensions are still installed, the following error is logged to the Wecerr.txt file:

The feature to remove by removing all meta data actually removes the FrontPage virtual directories for all other sites. In this case, the Server Extensions files and directories are still in each virtual site, but the virtual directories in IIS are removed.

To resolve this problem, obtain Microsoft Office 2000 Service Release 1/1a (SR-1/SR-1a).

To obtain SR-1/SR-1a, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

When you remove the Server Extensions from a virtual site and clear the Preserve web meta-information for a later upgrade or reinstall of the FrontPage Server Extensions check box, all of your FrontPage sites are inoperable to FrontPage. To resolve this problem, follow these steps to repair all of the FrontPage virtual sites:

1. Click Start, point to Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Server Extensions Administrator.
2. Under FrontPage Server Extensions, right-click the computer name, click Task, and then check the Server Extensions. Checking the Server Extensions at the computer name forces a repair on all FrontPage virtual sites. This procedure adds back the FrontPage virtual directories for all sites and makes them operable again.

See the "More Information" section for steps to avoid this problem in the future.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in FrontPage 2000 Server Extensions. This problem was corrected in Microsoft Office 2000 SR-1/SR-1a.

When it becomes necessary to remove the Server Extensions from a FrontPage Extended site, do not disable the Preserve web meta-information for a later upgrade or reinstall of the FrontPage Server Extensions check box. Alternatively, use the following steps:

1. Click Start, point to Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Server Extensions Administrator.
2. Under FrontPage Server Extensions and under the computer name, locate the virtual site where you want to remove the Server Extensions.
3. Right-click the virtual site, point to Task, and then click Remove Server Extensions.
4. In the Remove Server Extensions dialog box, do not disable the Preserve web meta-information for a later upgrade or reinstall of the FrontPage Server Extensions check box. Click OK.

If your intent is to uninstall and reinstall the Server Extensions to the virtual site, proceed with re-installing the server extensions to the virtual site.

If you want to permanently remove the Server Extensions from this virtual site, follow these steps to clean up residual virtual directories in the IIS Internet Service Manager:

1. Click Start, point to Programs, point to Microsoft Internet Server, and then click Internet Service Manager.
2. Click the WWW Service, and then click Properties.
3. Click the Directories tab.
4. On the Directories tab, locate the residual Server Extensions virtual directories for the site where you removed the Server Extensions. You should see the following residual virtual directories:
   
   _vti_pvt
   _vti_log
   _vti_cnf
   _vti_script
   _private
5. (Optional) Remove the remnant FrontPage Meta folders from the Content directory of the virtual site.