Updating your Web Connection server online can be accomplished in a number of different ways. The basic procedure is the same although there are some ways that can automate this process. All of the procedures have one thing in common: You have to somehow shut down the executable to replace the application EXE file.

Using the Update EXE Maintainence operation

This is the preferred mechanism for updating EXE files on the server, but this mechanism works well only if you're running your Web Connection Server as a COM object. It will also work for standalone applications, but the process is not fully automatic. This mechanism relies on a couple of entries in the wc.ini file to tell it where to find the application executable and the location of an file to update it with using the following keys:

ExeFile=d:\wwapps\wc\wcDemo.exe
UpdateFile=c:\temp\servers\wcdemo.exe

COM Operation

When you click the Update Exe link on the maintainence page under COM operation all servers are shut down first and all incoming requests are blocked for the duration of the update process. Then the new file is copied over the old one and the block is released. This operation takes only a few seconds if everything is set up correctly so you can do this with minimal downtime.

Warning The COM server that is updated on the server must have the same ClassIds as the server it is replacing. The Update procedure does not re-register the server, so if the ClassIds are different the new server will not be found and the server will not run. To avoid this make sure you build your COM objects on the same machine from the same project. If ClassIDs are changed for whatever reason, perform a manual code update and re-register the COM object on the server by running it there with the /regserver switch (From the DOS box: MyServer.exe /regserver)

File Based Operation

You can use this mechanism with File Based operation as well, but you will need to manage shutting down the running Web Connection server applications. You can use the Administration Page links to shut down the servers by repeatedly killing each server or by using the Process Viewer component on the bottom of the Admin page. You can then run the Update Exe link to update the files as above. The key difference here is that once the Web Connection servers are dead in File Based they won't automatically restart. You need to restart them by using the StartExe link on the Admin page which must be properly configured. The server will run invisibly and it will run under the SYSTEM account when it starts. This security context has several implications - SYSTEM generally doesn't have network rights to access files over the network. SYSTEM by default does have access to most local resource however. I highly recommend you experiment with the StartExe option before shutting down all of your servers on an online server! Make sure StartExe works before relying on it to restart your apps preferrably when you can sit in front of the box.