Samba share not working right with Excel 97

Phaethar · 03-03-2005, 02:53 PM

Hey all,

We're having some trouble saving Excel documents on our Samba Fileserver. We are moving people over to our Samba box, and have moved most of our documents over. Now, we have people opening their Excel documents, but are unable to save them. When something is saved, we see this message:

Code:

Your changes could not be saved to 'document.xls', but were saved to a temporary document named '349rgjh928'. Close the existing document, then open the temporary document and save it under a new name.

Now, these users have full access to the folder in which they're trying to save these sheets. New documents can be created an deleted without any problem, so it doesn't appear to be a permissions problem. However, if I manually set the document owner to the user trying to save the document, it seems to save without a problem. Of course, this isn't a viable option, as we have multiple people accessing these documents all the time, and as a group, they have full access to these folders.

So, I'm wondering what I can do on this system to resolve this issue. I know we're using an old version of Excel, but it still works for what we need. Our version of Samba is 3.0.10-1.fc2, and we are running on a Fedora Core 2 system. The clients connecting are using Windows XP Home, and have Excel 97 SR-2.

Any ideas on what I can do to clear this up? I can post config files if needed, but as of right now, it's almost the default with just the share volume set up.

Thanks!

jiml8 · 03-03-2005, 04:57 PM

Are you using security=user? If so, are you doing a "map network drive" on the Winsoze box, or are you merely browsing in via network neighborhood?

Is your Samba box set to be a browse master? A domain master? A WINS master?

Phaethar · 03-04-2005, 07:10 AM

Jiml8,

I'll try to run through your questions here:

Yes, we are using security=user.
We are mapping network drives on all of the Windows boxes.
The Samba box is not set up as a browse master, a domain, or for WINS.

This issue only seems to come up with Excel documents, but there isn't any good reason for it to happen that I can see.

If you need any other information, just let me know.

Thanks!

jiml8 · 03-04-2005, 08:08 AM

Quote:

This issue only seems to come up with Excel documents, but there isn't any good reason for it to happen that I can see.

I am wondering if Excel is timing out trying to read the file. Are you getting good, snappy response from Samba on opening windows and files?

I had a problem here with very slow response using security=user and I made a lot of progress by making the samba server a domain master, a wins master, and a browse master. Now, when a samba share is mapped as a network drive, the response is just fine.

Just a suggestion, and it pretty much exhausts my ideas on the topic.

Phaethar · 03-04-2005, 03:45 PM

Hey Jiml8,

Thanks for your suggestions with this. I've been testing this on and off again today, and the timing for bringing up these (or any) files is very quick. I don't believe it is an issue where something is timing out, but it might be worth trying to set it up as a browse master anyway

Also, just as an update, I tried setting up a FC3 system with Samba 3.0.11 to see if that would do anything differently. I also tried using OfficeXP to see if this was caused by using an old version of Excel. Unfortunately, I still get the same thing. Excel words the error a little differently, but it does the same thing, that being it saves a temp file but can't replace the original.

This is definitely a Samba issue, I'm really just hoping there is a way I can get around it.

jiml8 · 03-04-2005, 04:50 PM

I am running Samba 3.0.11 on a Mandrake installation, and just to try it, I fired up Excel 97 in a Win2K installation running in VMWare on the same Mandrake system. I then placed an xls file on a Linux share that is shared across my LAN using Samba.

I read the file using Excel 97, edited it, and wrote it without trouble. To verify that this was not some artifact of VMWare, I moved to another machine on my LAN (another Win2K box), accessed the share with Excel 97, loaded the file, edited it, and saved it without trouble.

Why don't you post your smb.conf, with the global info and the info on the particular share.

Phaethar · 03-07-2005, 08:29 AM

Ok, here is the smb.conf file. Some of the share settings are redundant, but better safe than sorry, right?

Code:

[global]
   workgroup = Production
   server string = Fileserver

   printcap name = /etc/printcap
   load printers = yes
   cups options = raw
   log file = /var/log/samba/%m.log
   max log size = 50

   security = user

   socket options = TCP_NODELAY SO_RCVBUF=8192 SO_SNDBUF=8192

   dns proxy = no

#============================ Share Definitions ==============================
[homes]
   comment = Home Directories
   browseable = no
   writable = yes
   valid users = %S
   create mode = 0600
   directory mode = 0600

[printers]
   comment = All Printers
   path = /var/spool/samba
   browseable = no
# Set public = yes to allow user 'guest account' to print
   guest ok = no
   writable = no
   printable = yes

[Share1]
   comment = Share1
   path = /folder1
   valid users = @accounting,@sales,@dataentry,@operations
   public = no
   writable = yes
   printable = no
   create mask = 3660
   directory mask = 3770

In your testing, you weren't possibly logged in as the owner of the Excel file, were you? That seems to be the only way I can allow a user to save their files is by changing them to be the owner of the file. Then, everything works as it should. This problem only shows up when they're trying to save a file and are not the owner, even though they are in the group that should have full access.

Thanks for all your help with this so far!

EDIT: I'm now seeing that users are unable to delete files as well, unless they are specifically set up as the file or folder owner, which is very difficult in an environment where so much is shared. If they are the owner, the file deletes just fine through Windows explorer. If they are not the owner (but still have full access by group) they can delete the file through Windows explorer just fine, but the file comes right back on a refresh. No errors... it just doesn't get deleted. I'm thinking this may be related to the Excel problem, but I have no idea why we can't delete files.

jiml8 · 03-07-2005, 10:26 PM

Quote:

In your testing, you weren't possibly logged in as the owner of the Excel file, were you? That seems to be the only way I can allow a user to save their files is by changing them to be the owner of the file. Then, everything works as it should. This problem only shows up when they're trying to save a file and are not the owner, even though they are in the group that should have full access.

I was almost certainly the owner of the xls files I was looking at.

I will bet your group definitions are inconsistent between samba and your windows clients. Your allowed users definitions will test NIS group definitions first, then Unix group definitions. Do you have NIS running?