Windows SharePoint relies on specific software installed on the windows server 2003. Front-end web servers required IIS and ASP.Net and backend server required SQL Server 2000 or MSDE. SharePoint services uses the following services of IIS;

• Virtual Servers
• Application Pools
• Authentication
• ASP.Net

Virtual Servers

IIS uses virtual servers to give websites administrative, security, and resource boundaries. The default virtual server installed by IIS is named Default Web Site and is located at the c:\inetpub\wwwroot folder. Windows SharePoint Services uses virtual

servers provided by IIS to host its websites. We can many virtual server as per our requirements but we much keep in mind that each virtual server is assigned a specific set of memory so it can affect the server. Virtual server can be used to create site collection for organization with multiple departments.

Application Pools

Introduced as part of IIS 6. Each application pool is an isolated set of worker processes in which Web applications are run. This means that different application pools use separate processor and memory resources. An application pool is also a security boundary because each application pool requires its own set of credentials on the server. Windows SharePoint Services uses IIS application pools for handling resource allocation in its websites. Different virtual pools can share Application pools and we can create 9 application pools on server.

Authentication

IIS performs authentication to validate user accounts that try to access its Web services. Authentication works on a per-virtual-server basis in IIS and in Windows SharePoint Services. Windows SharePoint Services lets IIS handle authentication on

the front-end Web server—so much so that changes to authentication must occur in IIS administrative tools as well as in Windows SharePoint Services administrative tools. Authentication can be

• Windows Integrated Authentication
• Forms Authentication
• Basic Authentication
• SSL Authentication

ASP.NET

When IIS installs, it has only a minimum configuration and does not install many of the features that it includes. This is for security reasons. Because many Windows SharePoint Services components are built on ASP.NET, the Application Server component

for ASP.NET must also be installed in IIS before beginning an installation of Windows SharePoint Services.