Removing .pdb from ASP.NET app on IIS breaks application

Question

I'm trying to deploy an ASP.NET MVC 4 application to IIS 8. When built with Debug mode selected in VS 2012, the application runs fine on IIS. However, when Release mode is selected, the application gives a yellow screen with a 404 error and something about the path not implementing IController.

I found out that adding the .pdb debug symbols to the bin/ folder on IIS, the application starts working fine.

Does anyone know why this is happening? I've played around with the Release mode build settings in VS, but to no avail.

Answer 1

Turns out I was using the StackFrame class, which of course doesn't work without the debug symbols present. Switched to using the CallerMemberName attribute in .NET 4.5 and everything is working fine now!