Turning Internet Explorer Automatic Login on for SharePoint Sites on Windows Servers
Posted
Tuesday, March 24, 2009 8:44 AM
by
CoreyRoth
Internet Explorer on Windows Server 2003 and 2008 is configured to run in a more secure manner than on client machines. This is a good practice, but when developing on a virtual machine, this extra layer of security can prove to be quite annoying when working with SharePoint. This is because you will be prompted for credentials every time you hit the site. If you are debugging, you certainly don’t want to have to enter your credentials every time you make a change.
Luckily, this is quite easy to fix. In Internet Explorer, log into your SharePoint site and then go to Tools –> Internet Options –> Security. Most likely the SharePoint site you are dealing with is in the Intranet or Trusted Sites zone. Click on the Custom Level button and then scroll all the way to the bottom of the list. Under User Authentication, Logon change the selection to Automatic logon with current username and password.
Once you have set that, you should no longer be prompted for credentials when visiting your SharePoint site. I probably wouldn’t use this on a production server, but for development, it is definitely the way to go.