Cannot read configuration file ' trying to read configuration data from file '\\?\<EMPTY>', line number '0'
If you recently installed the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, this problem and a solution for it may be covered in this Microsoft knowledge base article. The solution:
- Open an Administrator Command Prompt (not a Powershell prompt)
- Run:
net stop WAS /y - Run:
rmdir /s /q C:\inetpub\temp\appPools - Run:
net start W3SVC
Thanks to @weir for reporting this issue.
This wasn't a permission error in this instance, but it's would be well worth ensuring IIS_IUSRS has access to your site config just in case. See here
for steps on how to do this.
This issue appeared to be a virtual directory appeared in the IIS temp files, which was pointing to the wrong place. To fix:
- Go to the drive your IIS is installed on, eg.
C:\inetpub\temp\appPools\ - Delete the directory (or virtual directory) with the same name as your app pool.
- Recycle/Start your app pool again.