When you are developing a website on your PC, chances are that you will be running the site using http://localhost. Windows XP IIS servers only have one website, and all of the sites that you work on are put in separate Virtual Directories. This is why the Virtual Path settings on your PC are generally different from the actual web server that you will be deploying the site to. For this reason we have the created the host-dependent SitePath settings - so you can have one Web.config file and not have to change it before copying it from one server to another.

The SitePath variable tells VWD-CMS 1.0 where the real starting folder of the site is. If you put your site in a folder that is inside the IIS Application Path, you will want to set the SitePath to reflect that the site does not reside at the root of the Application Path.

The SitePath variable also allows VWD-CMS 1.0 to properly determine the correct URLs when rendering all content links and images - this makes it easy for you to share content blocks on various web pages that exist at different directory levels.

Setting the "SitePath.localhost" Value in the Web.config File

If you are running this site on http://localhost then you probably need to set the SitePath.localhost value in the Web.config file to get the paths configured properly.

Review the information in the Example section below to learn how to set the "SitePath.localhost" value. You can also look in the Server Settings section (at the bottom of the VWD-CMS Admin Page) to learn more about the specific settings on your web server.

An Example to Help You Configure the "SitePath.localhost" setting:

To open this window, right click on the ASP.NET Development Server icon in the Windows Taskbar Tray as illustrated in this screenshot:

Development Directory: C:\Dev\VwdCms\v010\

IIS / ASP.NET Virtual Path: /v010

Url to the site: http://localhost:3917/v010/

Base Path to the IIS Application: http://localhost:3917/

Corresponding SitePath.localhost setting: v010/

Here is how it should look in the Web.config file: (for this example)

<add key="SitePath.localhost" value="v010/"/>