I am developing custom web services that will be used in conjunction with a SharePoint site (WSS 3.0). No, before you ask, I am NOT talking about the built-in web services under the _vti_bin directory (lists.asmx). I am considering whether to host these as a virtual directory underneath the SharePoint web site on IIS. One reason is because we are using CACs to authenticate and we have to host the SharePoint site as an https:// site on port 443, and we may have firewall issues if we offer the web services under a different port.
So, are there advantages/disadvantages to doing this, or is it even possible? I am getting a Server Application Unavailable error at the moment for my asmx page.
UPDATE: I tried to run the Virtual Directory under it's own AppPool, and got the Server Application Unavailable error. When I switched to the AppPool used by SharePoint, the web services render correctly.
