Impersonate tag in Web.Config

Question

I'm using impersonate tag in my web.config in Asp.net 4.0 website.

Below is my Web.Config code:

<system.web>
    <authentication mode="Windows">
        <identity impersonate="true"                 
            userName="Administrator" 
            password="LALLA$26526"/>
     </authentication>
</system.web>

When I run app in Visual Studio I get this error:

Parser Error Message: Unrecognized element 'identity'.

Source Error:

Line 50:    <system.web>
Line 51:        <authentication mode="Windows">
Line 52:            <identity impersonate="true"             
Line 53:                 userName="Administrator"
Line 54:                 password="LALLA$26526"/>

Where am i going wrong?

score 85 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 02 '11 at 21:35

85

The identity section goes under the system.web section, not under authentication:

<system.web>
  <authentication mode="Windows"/>
  <identity impersonate="true" userName="foo" password="bar"/>
</system.web>

answered Aug 02 '11 at 21:35

Jacob

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I highly suspect there's some bad documentation out there in the wild that is causing everyone to make this same mistake; next person that encounters this, what was the bad reference you saw? Let's get it fixed at the source! – Jacob Sep 22 '16 at 16:32
2

Do you mean bad documentation like https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/72wdk8cc(v=vs.85).aspx which says that you can put the identity element anywhere in the config hierarchy – Mircea Ion Jan 16 '18 at 16:23
Perfect. Left them feedback. Maybe they'll make their docs clearer. What they mean by "config hierarchy" is referring to which type of config files it can appear in, not the location within in the config files. – Jacob Jan 16 '18 at 17:49
I know what you mean. At the bottom of the page they specify System.Web.Identity section but for someone comming accros this the first time it's still confusing. Plus now asp.net complains that this element is not supported in the integrated pipeline. – Mircea Ion Jan 16 '18 at 18:19

score 12 · Answer 2 · edited Jan 25 '16 at 14:06

12

Put the identity element before the authentication element

edited Jan 25 '16 at 14:06

Moslem Ben Dhaou

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answered Aug 02 '11 at 21:33

M4V3R1CK

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The sad thing is that this is actually the correct answer to the question. – Aelphaeis Aug 26 '14 at 13:42
@Aelphaeis Really ? position matters ? – Akshay Feb 15 '18 at 08:23
1

If and are both children of how could the order matter? – Rich May 23 '18 at 03:10

score 9 · Answer 3 · edited Jan 25 '16 at 14:06

9

You had the identity node as a child of authentication node. That was the issue. As in the example above, authentication and identity nodes must be children of the system.web node

edited Jan 25 '16 at 14:06

Moslem Ben Dhaou

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answered Feb 12 '15 at 13:52

sharad shrestha

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Impersonate tag in Web.Config

3 Answers3

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