Adding System.Web.Mvc to \bin makes MVC 3 app throw a 403.14 Forbidden

Question

So I'm trying to deploy an MVC 3 app to a web server. If I don't include the System.Web.Mvc dll in the \bin directory, I get the configuration error saying it can't find the assembly System.Web.Mvc, which is to be expected. However, as soon as I add the assembly, I get at 403.14 Forbidden error. I've tried everything from installing MVC 3 on the server to running the command: C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\aspnet_regiis -ir

The app pool is set to Asp.net v4.0 integrated pipeline. Super frustrated so any other ideas would be helpful. I've read through all posts on SO to no avail.

Server is Windows 2008 Enterprise 32-bit. .NET 4 is installed.

Update: I've discovered that some role services for IIS were disabled on the server. Namely HTTPRedirection and Static Content Compression. Installing those two services allows the web app to run, but the installation actually fails and says it needs to reboot to undo the changes. After reboot, the app obviously stops working. At least I know what the issue is now. I'm going to disable some services on the server and try to install the role services again.

If you have control of the server, why not just install MVC on it? — Erik Funkenbusch, Apr 27 '12 at 18:56
Also, works just fine on the QA server, just not the test server. Trying to figure out what's different but I've been at it for 5 hours now. :-/ — dolphy, Apr 27 '12 at 19:00
If you have installed MVC, then you don't need to include system.web.mvc in the bin directory. — Erik Funkenbusch, Apr 27 '12 at 19:01
@MystereMan -- I'm aware of that fact. I uninstalled it to see if the install was bad and/or if it would work by just adding the dlls to the bin directory. I've tried reinstalling MVC 3. Removing the application and redeploying from scratch, etc. — dolphy, Apr 27 '12 at 19:04
I've tried with a barebones ASP.NET MVC 3 app and get the same result. — dolphy, Apr 27 '12 at 19:07
Maybe it's something in your application that causes the problem. Have you tried to deploy the default MVC3 visual studio project template? — Hanno, Apr 27 '12 at 19:54

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 30 '12 at 16:33

SOLVED! Hopefully this helps someone else. There were IIS Role Services that were not installed on the web server. This test server was supposed to be setup exactly like our development server, but it was not. Anyway, HTTP Redirection and Static Content Compression were not installed...among some other services. When I tried to install them, I received an installation error that would require a reboot in order to rollback the changes. I had to uninstall Windows Process Activation Service and reinstall IIS. At that point, I install ASP.NET MVC 3 and ran: C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\aspnet_regiis -ir and now everything works.

Adding System.Web.Mvc to \bin makes MVC 3 app throw a 403.14 Forbidden

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