Hello Dominick,

In Fact i have tried several way to authenticate a user.

Windows Integrated Authentication is working fine.

I tried then the basic authentication . IIS Configured as basic Auth.
config file with <authentication mode="windows"/> but when the windows
login box appear at client side (xp pro sp2) no accounts that i have
defined on server 2003 is valid and i can't authenticate any defined
user. Should user require to be member of a particular group other than
Domain users?

I have tried the same thing on windows 2000 server and i was working
fine.

_______

in a second test i tried forms authentication with credentials in
config file. IIS configured as anonymous authentication. Is it Correct?
As you say "set IIS to do no authentication" do you mean uncheck all
Authentication mode in IIS or just let anonymous authentication checked
with "Ask IIS to authenticate" unchecked and then choose a new account
for impersonation .

Config file with

<authentication mode="Forms"/>
<forms loginUrl="Login.aspx">
<credentials passwordFormat="Clear">
<user name="username" password="password">
</credentials>
</forms >
</authentication>

<authorization>
 <deny users="?" />
</authorization>

By doing this way and calling the default website url it goes directly
to the default page Home.aspx and display no User.Identity.name. the
user has not yet been authenticated and is not redirected to the login
page.

Except if I have not setup IIS correctly for autentication by choosing
the wrong options I don't understand why it behaves this way. Do you
have any clue?

Eric