4.4 Deploying a .NET Application

The system administrator is responsible for installing and configuring the application. This task includes assigning user accounts to the roles defined by .NET role-based security (see Chapter 10) and assigning appropriate levels of trust to the assemblies that make up the application. Equally important is the configuration of the services required by the application, such as database and directory servers.

If you are the system administrator, you have an obligation to gain an understanding of how the application should be configured, and to spend the time to determine how the security configuration is best tailored to your enterprise. You have a reasonable expectation that the software publisher will provide you with a robust and functional application, and the software publisher has a reasonable expectation that you will install and configure its application by following its instructions and by applying your knowledge of the company.

Nonetheless, you should consider carefully the levels of trust that you assign to a publisher's assemblies, and ensure that you are not granting an application more permissions than it requires to perform correctly. You should also ensure that you are not compromising the security of your corporate network by configuring the application and the services that it depends on.

Your final obligation is to monitor the application in order to watch for security defects or breaches and to report these problems to the software publisher. See Section 4.6 for an explanation of how the management of security continues for as long as the application is in use.