IIS remote debugging fails - w3wp.exe is inactive

Question

I am trying to debug an IIS web service using remote debugging. Due to our domain configuration (which we CAN’t change), I am denied access during remote debugging using the default setting. The only solution I found was to switch to the Remote option (Native only without no authentication) in VS 2008.

The problem is that when I connect to the remote system, w3wp.exe is grayed out and, oddly enough, it is the only one on the list. Is this related to remote selection? Is there any way around this?

Answer 1

I really solved my problem. W3wp.exe was grayed out because I installed the debug diagnostic tool on the server machine and installed it for a subsequent failure of IIS. Despite the fact that the program was not running, the debugging process was still "marked" (this may be an absolutely wrong assumption). After removing the "markers", I could connect to the process.

So, check your services / programs if something has already been attached to this process. It does not solve the problem of the lack of the ability to debug managed code.

Answer 2

When you switch to "Only for native without authentication" mode, you explicitly declare that you want to debug "native", that is, Win32 code, not .net code. Unfortunately, as far as I know, this is not the case (I tried! :().