Activating a feature from STSADM

If you have a feature that times-out when you try to activate it in the Site Settings on the web, then you will need to activate it on the command line.

1.	Move to the 12 hive.
	a.	Unless you have installed WSS someplace other than the default, you can find the 12 hive at C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\12\
2.	Make sure your feature is in the subfolder \TEMPLATE\FEATURES\ inside the 12 hive.
3.	Move into the bin folder.
4.	Run the STSADM command to activate the feature.
	STSADM -o ActivateFeature -Url {your site} -FileName {the feature.xml inside your feature}
	EX: STSADM -o ActivateFeature -Url http://www.thesite.com/ -FileName My_DirectCustomer\feature.xml
5.	If you've made core changes to your feature, you'll need to deactivate and reactivate. Do the same command only with DeactivateFeature first.