Bug: VS 2017 ASP.NET Core app published to IIS [same machine]

Question

First creating a new project in VS 2017 with template of ASP.NET Core (and individual authentication) does not have a web.config; yet is added upon publishing the app to C:\inetpub\wwwroot (on new install of Window server 2016, and VS on same machine).

When published, it fails to open a web page giving a "500 - Internal server error" page display. Going into IIS Manager after clicking on mySite in left panel, trying to click on anything in the middle panel for the hosted web site fails to open with this error:

As you can also see it gives no information into the actual error. So not sure why it's looking to \\?\C: for the web.config file? I believe if I can get help resolving this the web page should load; as it does load in development. As stated this issue is occurring on just deployment of a basic ASP.NET Core template; but it also is doing the same thing with my previous web site created with VS 2015 Community ported over to VS 2017 (with required update to it by VS)

The web.config file, which is only in the published app folder and not the development project folders, is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<configuration>
  <system.webServer>
    <handlers>
      <add name="aspNetCore" path="*" verb="*" modules="AspNetCoreModule" resourceType="Unspecified" />
    </handlers>
    <aspNetCore processPath="dotnet" arguments=".\Laier-IT.dll" stdoutLogEnabled="false" stdoutLogFile=".\logs\stdout" />
  </system.webServer>
</configuration>

Answer 1

This type of issue is typical of an IIS configuration that is not configured for .Net Core.

In order to host .Net Core applications in IIS it is necessary to install the .NET Core Windows Server Hosting bundle.

For detailed instructions on installing the .Net Core Windows Server Hosting bundle checkout the Microsoft documentation on installing .Net Core Windows Server Hosting.

This document also provides extensive information on deploying .Net Core to IIS and various other HTTP Servers.

Additionally you need to set the .Net CLR to no managed code in the application pool settings: