AJS 4.x Manual

Note! This Manual is for the "Windows authentication" version, which is designed to work with existing Windows server or Active Directory accounts and Windows authentication. If you want to create accounts by yourself and store their credentials in your own HTTP Commander XML database, you need to download the "Forms authentication" version! This Manual is for the Windows authentication version only!

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Upgrade from old versions

This page describes upgrade process of HTTP Commander.
There are 2 ways to perform upgrade of HTTP Commander to latest version:

• Automatic upgrade from admin panel. Supported starting from version 4.5.
• Manual upgrade.

We are ready to assist you with upgrade process. Feel free to contact us if you have any questions or need to have assistance on upgrade.

Automatic upgrade from admin panel.

Starting with version 4.5, it is possible to use semi-automatic upgrade procedure to upgrade to latest version. So, if your current version of HTTP Commander is 4.5 and later and you need to upgrade to any later version, here are the steps:

1. Login to HTTP Commander under administrator account
2. Open Admin Panel and navigate to Upgrade tab. Here yo can see current version number and version number of latest available release.
3. There are 2 sections : Manual upgrade and Automated upgrade.
   In Automated upgrade section click on "Step#1" button to start upgrade process.
4. Click on "Backup" button of "Step #1" section for backup file creation
5. Once backup is ceated, link to download backup file will be available.
   Click on that link to download backup archive and activate next step.
6. "Step #3" becomes activated.
   • To automatically download latest version and restore settings from previously created backup,
     keep all fields empty and click on "Install new version with keeping all settings".
   • If you would like to upgrade to custom build of HTTP Commander (not the latest one available on element-it web site) , then you should place distibution package on your web server ( the same server where HTTP Commander is installed on) and specify local path to distribution package in the first input field.
   • To restore settings from another backup file (not this one you just created on the step #1), click "Browse" button near the bottom input field and select backup archive.

Manual upgrade

Below are the steps for performing the manual upgrade procedure. Despite the fact that there are many steps, the upgrade procedure is not as complex as it seems.
In short you will need to perform 3 main steps : backup current folder, copy new version, restore settings.

• Back up whole HTTP Commander installation folder, usually "C:\inetpub\wwwroot\HTCOMNET\".

• Back up NTFS permissions (optional). You can skip this step if you use FORMS auth version without AD integration.

  Note If you skip this step, you'll need to restore NTFS permissions manually after installing the new version.

  Note This step applies to Windows Server 2003 SP2, Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016 and newer versions of Windows OS.

  Execute the following command as administrator:

  icacls C:\inetpub\wwwroot\HTCOMNET /save C:\htcomnet.acl /T

  Here "C:\inetpub\wwwroot\HTCOMNET" is HTTP Commander installation folder, "C:\htcomnet.acl" is a file to store NTFS permissions.

• Download the last version of the application on the Web file manager HTTP Commander page.
• Unblock distribution archive if you used Internet Explorer browser to download the archive.
• Delete all files in the HTTP Commander installation folder.
• Install the new version, that is unpack the archive into the installation folder.
• Restore Data\ subfolder, HttpCommanderSettings.config¹ file from backup archive.

• Restore the NTFS permissions (only if you saved them earlier).

  Execute the following command as administrator:

  icacls C:\inetpub\wwwroot /restore C:\htcomnet.acl /C

  Here "C:\inetpub\wwwroot" is the parent folder of HTTP Commander installation folder, "C:\htcomnet.acl" is a file with NTFS permissions.
  /C flag is to ignore errors about missed files (some files from old version could be missed in new one)

• Revise the NTFS permissions in HTTP Commander installation folder². NTFS permissions of the installation folder itself will not change (unless you recreated the folder). You need to revise permissions on Data subfolder, HttpCommanderSettings.config, etc.
• Reapply all changes you made to the HTTP Commander source files. For example, you may have customized the Default.aspx, Logout.aspx pages, localizations files in the Localizations subfolder. We discourage you from using files from an old installation of HTTP Commander. All customizations performed through Admin panel web interface are saved in the HttpCommanderSettings.config file and Data subfolder, you do not need to reapply them, with minor exceptions. A few settings from Admin panel are saved in the web.config, namely mail settings and authentication mode. You need to port them to the new web.config file.
• Restore following settings from Web.config file:
  • system.net/mailsettings
  • tempDirectory at system.web/compilation section (if you used a custom path).
• If you did customized WebDAV identifier, you need to configure access on WebDAV.
  Please note, that starting from version 4.5 it is possible to automatically perform this configuration from Diagnostics.aspx page.
  Open Diagnostics.aspx page, scroll to WebDav section and click on "Configure WebDAV" button if required.
  
  For versions prior 4.5, please open Web.config file for editing (for example in notepad) and add (if not exists) before the opening tag <system.webServer> next lines:

  <location path="your_webdav_identifier">
      <system.web>
          <authorization>
              <allow users="*" />
          </authorization>
      </system.web>
  </location>

  where your_webdav_identifier— value of IdentifierWebDav parameter (default value hcwebdav).
  Also, it is necessary to configure anonymous access for the folder with a name entered in parameter IdentifierWebDav (default value hcwebdav).
  For this see articles Configuring anonymous IIS6 authentication on WebDav folder or Configuring anonymous IIS7+ authentication on WebDav folder.
  Also, starting from version 2.0.11 if enabled parameter AnonymousEditingOffice: path to connect WebDAV folder begins with http://yourdomain/HTCOMNET/hcwebdav/0/ (added suffix '0').
  For more info see article Web folders.
• For a version specific changes, please check Update notes section.
  This section also contain instructions to apply changes to your old web.config file (in case if you decided to keep your old web.config instead of using the one from new version)

Note 1 Old versions (prior to 1.7 version) of HTTP Commander stored settings in the appSettings collection of the web.config file, there was no HttpCommanderSettings.config file. You need to manually port the settings to the new configuration file.

Note 2 Starting from version 2.0.6 HTTP Commander requires at least 4.0 version of .NET framework.
How to check version of .NET framework (on IIS 7 and later):

• Open Application Pools in IIS Manager
• Select HTTP Commander application pool. See How to detect application pool HTTP Commander runs under?.
• Click "Basic Settings..." on Actions pane.
• "Edit application pool" window appears
• Select .NET Framework version in combobox.
• Click OK button

Note 3 You may skip the step of revising NTFS permissions on installation files if you copy new distribution files over the old installation or if you restore permissions with icacls utility. In copy over scenario you need to manually remove files that are missing in the new version of HTTP Commander.