Excel Files Are Getting Renamed

[Guest]

I found out today about a problem that began, apparently, this Monday.

A specific set of users have found that opening an excel spreadsheet file
and closing it - regardless of whether a change was made, file renamed, or
saved - results in the filename and suffix changing.

Example: original filename "today.xls" and once it is opened and closed, it
is now named "De0328" with no .xls suffix. (note that "De0328" is an example
- the files are renamed into apparently random numbers and letters - eight
characters - without the .xls suffix)

Adding a .xls to the filename allows Excel to reopen the file and all the
data is there.

This behavior is repeatable from multiple workstations, all XP SP1 or SP2.

The target data is on a shared drive on a Win2K server, and happens to be
part of our first DFS root implementation as well (files only replicated with
DFS, not yet accessed via DFS).

An antivirus scan of both file server and DFS came up squeaky clean.

Any help is greatly appreciated, thanks in advance !

No unusual error messages in either servers event logs.

 

[Dave Peterson]

When excel saves the file, it saves it as a temporary file with a funny name (8
characters--no extension).

If the save is successful, xl will delete the original (or rename it to its
backup name (like "backup of book1.xlk)) and if that's successful, xl will
rename the funny named file to the original's name.

Common things that get blamed for interruptions to this process are antivirus
software poking its head in or network errors--either permissions or physical
problems.

Maybe temporarily disabling the antivirus software would be the easier thing to
test. If that doesn't help, maybe there was a permissions change???

 

[Guest]

Dave, I ran across something similar in my researching this earlier today, too.

We use Trend Micro's ServerProtect and this problem *is not* happening on
other servers and shares with Excel spreadsheets - which doesn't mean there
isn't a problem on these affected servers - but for my money makes antivirus
a less likely prospect.

We have no indications of any type of network problems - but I'll look at
that more closely tomorrow.

Thanks for the tips.

Bill

When excel saves the file, it saves it as a temporary file with a funny name (8
characters--no extension).

If the save is successful, xl will delete the original (or rename it to its
backup name (like "backup of book1.xlk)) and if that's successful, xl will
rename the funny named file to the original's name.

Common things that get blamed for interruptions to this process are antivirus
software poking its head in or network errors--either permissions or physical
problems.

Maybe temporarily disabling the antivirus software would be the easier thing to
test. If that doesn't help, maybe there was a permissions change???