14 DAY TRIAL // The Release Candidate of IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 is a download offered free of charge from Microsoft for customers that need to do search engine optimization for websites leveraging Windows Server and Internet Information Services as the backend infrastructure. IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 RC is a free IIS extension available via either the Microsoft Web Platform Installer or as 32-bit (x86) and 64-bit (x64) standalone downloads. Fact is that the Redmond company has intended for the IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 module to be used in concert with another search engine optimization IIS extension, which was released to web in November, namely the IIS SEO Toolkit.
“IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 adds support for outbound response rewriting and enables Web administrators to create powerful rules to implement URLs that are easier for users to remember and easier for search engines to find. IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 can now replace the URLs generated by a Web application in the response HTML with a more user friendly and search engine friendly equivalent, modify the links in the HTML markup generated by a Web application behind a reverse proxy, and fix up the content of any HTTP response by using regular expression pattern matching,” revealed Eric Rezabek, senior product manager IIS/Web.
According to Microsoft, IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 has been designed in order to allow seamless integration with IIS features already in place in order to drive management, performance and troubleshooting to the next level. What the IIS extension is set up to do is essentially rewrite URLs for a certain website. Specifically, IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 will ensure that all links on a website are not only user friendly, but also search engine friendly. In this context, the IIS extension is not only capable of ensuring a boost in user experience but also drive additional traffic to online properties.
“IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 helps to easily define rules that match URLs or HTTP headers to generate more friendly and consistent URLs, protect content and assets from unauthorized linking and scanning, and integrate with existing IIS features to improve management, performance, and troubleshooting,” Rezabek added.
IIS URL Rewriter 2.0 Release Candidate (RC) is available for download here.