Question

How to get the path that usually looks like %SystemDrive%\inetpub\wwwroot ?

I guess it’s something to do with Microsoft.Web.Administration.ServerManager class, but I couldn’t find a way.

Update: I’m trying to get the path from standalone app. Not an ASP.NET web app.

Answer 1

To discover the physical path of a website from a standalone application you can do the following:

// If IIS7
// Add reference to Microsoft.Web.Administration in 
// C:\windows\system32\inetsrv

using Microsoft.Web.Administration;
...

int iisNumber = 2;

using(ServerManager serverManager = new ServerManager())
{
  var site = serverManager.Sites.Where(s => s.Id == iisNumber).Single();
  var applicationRoot = 
           site.Applications.Where(a => a.Path == "/").Single();
  var virtualRoot = 
           applicationRoot.VirtualDirectories.Where(v => v.Path == "/").Single();
  Console.WriteLine(virtualRoot.PhysicalPath);
}

If you’re using IIS 6 (or the IIS6 admin compatibility layer for IIS7)

// If IIS6
// Add reference to System.DirectoryServices on .NET add ref tab

using System.DirectoryServices;
...

int iisNumber = 2;

string metabasePath = String.Format("IIS://Localhost/W3SVC/{0}/root", iisNumber);
using(DirectoryEntry de = new DirectoryEntry(metabasePath))
{
  Console.WriteLine(de.Properties["Path"].Value);
}

Both these examples demonstrate how to discover the path to the root of a Web Site.

To discover the path to a virtual directory you need to amend the paths as necessary.