some word documents seem to be "tied" to DC

[bookouri]

We just shut down one of our DCs to do some updates and suddenly some user's word documents take a minute or two to open. It doesnt matter if we are trying to open the document from a network location or if we copy the file to the local machine and try to open it. Some documents, NOT ALL, are doing this. As long at that DC is offline this happens. If we bring the DC back online everything starts working fine. How can word documents be tied to a DC? None of these documents were ever stored on the DC. The shared templates used to create these documents have never been stored on the DC. Can anybody point me to what's happening here?

 

[SkipVought]

Please define your acronyms.

Skip,
^{Don't let the Diatribe...
talk you to death!}
_{Just traded in my old subtlety...
for a NUANCE!}

 

[bookouri]

Domain Controller, DC??

 

[dstewa27]

yes DC is Domain Controller

 

[mdav2]

I think word documents hold path details from normal template used to create them. Perhaps the normal.dot used to create these files existed on a network somewhere. When you switch off your DC it can't find the normal anymore and so tries a search which is taking the time.

I've also had this with really old document files (Word 2). I got around this by just sving them in the later version.

Mark Davies
Warwickshire County Council

 

[fumei]

I think word documents hold path details from normal template used to create them. "

In a good world, Word documents never use Normal.dot. None of mine do.

Seriously though, the principle is the same, if the template linked to the document (and all Word documents have an attached template) is no longer at the location stored in the document, you will get issues.

However...."The shared templates used to create these documents have never been stored on the DC. "

Well then. So the templates are still at the same UNC path? Exactly the same?

Gerry

 

[Lilliabeth]

I'll grant you this is an odd problem... and a possible answer gets off in the deep technical weeds pretty quickly...

You're question implies you have multiple DCs (Domain Controllers), so I am confident that you are familiar with their basic function--what follows is for other readers of this post: Domain Controllers are used to authenticate users and services on a network (they validate that you are who you say you are). They also often double as Active Directory integrated internal DNS Servers (machines that map names and services to IP Addresses and vice versa)
They also occasionally are used as DFS (Distributed File System) Root servers... I could go on...

Every function I just mentioned has some capacity to cause your problem in the right combination of circumstances.

For example, if you have 4 DCs, but only one is acting as a DNS server, when it goes down, you have reduced capacity to resolve the names of any network resources, such as the UNC Path to the template source \\SomeNode\Templates.

A DFS Root is a node that simplifies network sharing... if you're using it, and your DC is hosting the DFS Root... it can't redirect callers to the proper node.

One thing does seem clear... the word documents that are giving you fits are attempting to connect to some network resource, probably not the DC, and the DC is playing havoc on name resolution of the resource, authentication to touch the resource, or both.

Deeper still: Not all DCs are the same... when you get some free time Google "Single Mastered Operations"...

Best luck.


--Lilliabeth

 

[bookouri]

Ive got 3 DC's and one of the other DCs has all the 5 "roles".. all the DCs are active directory DNS servers and global catalogs.

all the templates are stored on a file server and their location (entire UNC) hasnt changed for a year or more.

I really interested in the comment "In a good world, Word documents never use Normal.dot. None of mine do." though. I have never messed with normal.dot. How would I go about getting rid of normal.dot. That has caused problems in the past with other things.