MVC3 scheduled task in hosted environment

Question

I have an mvc3 web app and I need to run a scheduled task.

My hosting company (discountasp.net) allows me to run scheduled tasks but if they are password protected I need to lock down the directory (using a web.config file)

This is fine for a web forms app since I could just move all those pages into a specific (locked down) directory. But for an MVC app where the pages are not divided by directories I'm not sure how I can do this.

I didn't know if anyone else has run across this and what might be the best option.

Answer 1

This may be an over simplification, but couldn't you just create a controller/action that does what you need to do on a schedule, place an authorize attribute on it that would cause that action to require a username/password and go from there? Since I don't use discountasp.net, I am not clear on how you setup a scheduled task, but if it is just hitting a URL at a scheduled time, then you should be good to go.

Else, if it is not hitting a URL but actually calling a file from the server side (not over HTTP), you can create a folder (think like your Content directory - perhaps called it ScheduledTasks), place some code in there (even a webforms page if you like), place the proper security items in your web.config to require a password and lastly, add the path to the file to your Routes.IgnoreRoute collection.