Install WordPress on IIS With a MSSQL Backend

There are instructions out there that say to just use Web Platform Installer (Web PI) from IIS Manager to install WordPress. The problem with this is that it will install an instance of SQL Server Express on the web server. If you’re OK with that, then by all means, use Web PI. However, I already had a SQL Server instance on another box. If this is your case, then just follow these instructions. Here are the instructions from the site, which are extremely easy:

  1. Download wordpress, unzip the package and put the file in place.
  2. Download the plugin package.
  3. Upload wp-db-abstraction.php and the wp-db-abstraction directory to wp-content/mu-plugins. This should be parallel to your regular plugins directory. If the mu-plugins directory does not exist, you must create it.
  4. Put the db.php file from inside the wp-db-abstraction.php directory to wp-content/db.php
  5. Visit $your_wordpress_url/wp-content/mu-plugins/wp-db-abstraction/setup-config.php to generate your wp-config.php file
  6. Install WordPress normally

Happy blogging!

NOTE: Can’t see any posts after installation? Follow this thread, or modify the mu-plugins/wp-db-abstraction/translations/sqlsrv/translations.php file:

/*
        // Check for true offset
        if ( count($limit_matches) == 5 && $limit_matches[1] != '0' ) {
            $true_offset = true;
        } elseif ( count($limit_matches) == 5 && $limit_matches[1] == '0' ) {
            $limit_matches[1] = $limit_matches[4];
        }
*/
        // Check for true offset
        if ( count($limit_matches) == 5 && $limit_matches[1] != '0' ) {
          $true_offset = true;
        } elseif ( count($limit_matches) >= 5 && $limit_matches[1] == '0' ) {
          $limit_matches[1] = $limit_matches[4];
        }

See wordpress.org