IIS is a full-featured web and FTP server with some powerful admin tools, strong security features, and can be used to host ASP.NET and PHP applications on the same server. You can even host WordPress sites on IIS. There are three ways to install and set up a website in IIS on Windows 10; using the Graphical User Interface (GUI), PowerShell, or Windows CMD. We’ll be using each method to do a basic installation of IIS.
Install IIS Using The GUI
This is the point-and-click method to set up a website in IIS. It’s the ideal method if you haven’t learned PowerShell or Windows commands.
Create Your First Web Page for IIS
Before we go into the other two methods of installing IIS, let’s see where the files that make your website are stored. We’ll also make a very basic web page. Once you know how to do this, you’ll know the basics to jump into learning web design and development.
Hello World!
That’s it! You’ve just created and published your first website on IIS.Install IIS Using Windows Commands
We can reduce the process of installing IIS to a one-line command. It can be done in either Windows Command Prompt or using PowerShell. We’ll show you how to do it with Windows command first, but learning PowerShell would be of great benefit in the future.
Install IIS Using PowerShell
Learning to do things like installing IIS in PowerShell is a huge benefit for two reasons. One, it’s the easiest and fastest way to do most administrative tasks in Windows. Two, you can save your PowerShell commands, known as cmdlets, as a script and run them anytime on any Windows computer or server.
You’re The Web Now!
This is just the beginning of what you can do with making your own website in IIS. Look into using IIS for FTP file transfer or media hosting as well. Also, look into Microsoft’s Web Platform Installer for simplified ways to install and learn things like WordPress, PHP, Python, and more.
