May 17, 2011 09:45 GMT  ·  By

Microsoft has released to web version 2.0 of Web Application Configuration Analyzer (WACA), which can now be downloaded from the company.

As was the case with v1.0, Web Application Configuration Analyzer 2.0 RTW can be leveraged in server configuration analysis scenarios.

Any such evaluation would have at its base a collection of security best practices that Microsoft has put together for a range of its server technologies.

In this regard, Web Application Configuration Analyzer 2.0 RTW is designed to play nice with such products as Windows, IIS , ASP.NET and SQL Server.

What the analyzer is meant to do is scan pre-production and production servers, and verify whether they match a set of best practices from Microsoft or not.

What customers need to know is that the Redmond company is virtually acting out of experience here.

The set of best practices is put together from the Microsoft Information Security & Risk Management Deployment Review Standards which the software giant uses internally for its entire line of business applications.

According to Microsoft in “this release of WACA we included some new features:

•Suppressions – you can now suppress any rule you feel is not appropriate for your scan.

•Saving of suppression files – once you set up a suppression list you want to use you can save it off for future uses.

•You can change the suppressions and regenerate the report without needing to re-run the scan.

•Reporting – Updated the reporting section to include suppression information so you know what passed, failed, was not applicable and what was suppressed.

•Multiple reports – you can view multiple scans of the same machine or view a single machine’s scan and compare it to other machines.

•Export to the Microsoft RED format.

•Scan multiple systems and SQL instances in one bulk scan.

•Additional rules – we’ve added in additional SQL rules.

•And of course bug fixes that were missed in the last release.”

Microsoft Web Application Configuration Analyzer v2.0 is available for download here.