asp.net - What happens when I edit web.config?

Question

I need to edit the web.config file on a live Sharepoint environment, but I'm unsure what will happen if I do (I want to output custom errors).

Will this cause the IIS6 worker process to recycle?

Will active users lose their session state because of this?

Or can I safely edit the file?

Answer 1

The application pool will restart and session state will be lost. Imagine each ASP.NET application (as defined in IIS) is a program on the desktop. Saving web.config will do something similar to closing the program and reopening it.