Introduction
Once you have enabled shared configuration, a common question is what happens when the network share that serves those files becomes unavailable. The Web server will continue to run because it has cached configuration in memory, but once the Web service is restarted or the server rebooted, W3SVC will be unable to access configuration. To ensure that the Web server can always access the configuration files, it is recommended that you use either Distributed File System (DFS) with replication or offline files.
The offline files feature, or client side caching, enables files stored on a network share to be accessed even when the network share is unavailable. It is a simple solution for ensuring the configuration files are always available and is recommended for the shared configuration files. However, offline files are not recommended for the Web site content, because this reduces throughput.
More Information
For Web site content, you may wish to consider using DFS for your file servers. For more information about DFS, go to the Distributed File System documentation at http://technet2.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/library/1f0d326d-35af-4193-bda3-0d1688f90ea71033.mspx?mfr=true.
For more information about client side caching, go to http://www.microsoft.com/.
Configuring
To configure offline files
1. On the file server, modify the share used for storing shared configuration files by running the following command:
Net share centralconfig$ /cache:programs
2. On the Web server, in Control Panel, open Offline Files.
3. In the Offline Files dialog box, click Enable Offline Files. Do not reboot the machine yet.
4. Ensure that the cache is set to read only by running the following command:
REG ADD "HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\CSC\Parameters" /v ReadOnlyCache /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
5. Reboot the Web server.
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