EPiServer backend interface only partially loaded in Internet Explorer

Long time no see! Since last time I’ve switched employer and I’m currently in over my head learning about all the wonders that is the EPiServer CMS system as an employee at Knowit.

Today I was setting up the Tech Alloy sample site using the EPiServer Deployment Center and once I got it running, created a user and logged in I could not access the right click EPiServer context menu and when browsing to the backend I got this weird look:

EpiServer not fully loaded.

It was as if some client side errors caused the interface not to load correctly… After some clicking around I asked my colleague Kim and it turns out that in Windows Server environments there is something called Internet Explorer Enhanced Security (IE ESC) enabled by default which disables a lot of javascript stuff in IE (I’m running in a VM with Windows Server 2008 R2 x64). So he pointed me to Server Manager –> Configure IE ESC where I could turn this off:

Turning IE Enhanced Security off

Et voila, now the backend user interface works:

EPiServer backend working