SIMs Server Migration - Documents Server Issue

Glad it's working for one of you :)

The C:\sims\documents folder was a default location that was used. I used to get this on my old vms, everytime i cloned a VM it would revert to this default. There is no 'correct' location, you should specify it to be where you want and test, to make sure it works okay.

I had some weird problems on my new server when i inadvertently used the same port as the network proxy server, :doh:

@LazyD having two folders inside your docstorage location, reeks of a new server / test server being on the network, and sims not being configured to point to the right place. I've done this many a time, you restore a backup to a test server and it is configured to point to the live server docstorage location. If they are on the network and can communicate, if you start using reports and trying to access them, it creates its own folder in the docstorage folder but with it's own servername. it's actually quite handy as it stops any corruption to your live data.

Configuring the docstorage location via setups in sims is important, but i often found it wouldnt work and it was better to use dmconfig - this is the same process. However this is missing from your original method, and as you said you've never needed that step before, i suspect the crazy folder naming structure has come from various instances and server names being muddled together over time in the same location.

As you said the original / old server had a strange location, i think that the files you've copied to new server are not the real ones, or there is still an error in the pathname. If the old server is still available, fire it up and test reports still work, then check where they are pointing. Copy over the docstorage folder from old server again, you'll know if you're getting the real one, if you've ever used it much, as the size will be quite sizeable. Ours is nearly 3GB now i think. If possible only take over the final folder, above the one with the aa,a0,b1 etc. Put that in the new server at a preconfigured location and rename it to match the databasename if required.

The path naming structure is covered in KB20794 from SupportNet, you might like to also look at KB30365 for DMS reinstallation guidelines and KB25822 for general advice on moving to new location. Some (probably) all the info is included in this thread, but it might be easier for you to look at the original documentation in order from one place.

Apologies if you're already tried all this, but it sounds like it's best to start from scratch.

Thanks for your reply vikpaw

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@LazyD having two folders inside your docstorage location, reeks of a new server / test server being on the network, and sims not being configured to point to the right place. I've done this many a time, you restore a backup to a test server and it is configured to point to the live server docstorage location. If they are on the network and can communicate, if you start using reports and trying to access them, it creates its own folder in the docstorage folder but with it's own servername. it's actually quite handy as it stops any corruption to your live data.

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Quite possibly, haven't worked at this school before.

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As you said the original / old server had a strange location, i think that the files you've copied to new server are not the real ones, or there is still an error in the pathname. If the old server is still available, fire it up and test reports still work, then check where they are pointing. Copy over the docstorage folder from old server again, you'll know if you're getting the real one, if you've ever used it much, as the size will be quite sizeable. Ours is nearly 3GB now i think. If possible only take over the final folder, above the one with the aa,a0,b1 etc. Put that in the new server at a preconfigured location and rename it to match the databasename if required.

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I turned on the old server and checked it's connect.ini for the correct instance and db name. With that info I tracked down the correct set of folders, with someone from capita support telling me that I only have to copy over the last folder in the path, which is the db name, so I copied that over again incase something had previously gone wrong with the copy. So if the structure is D:\DOCSTORAGE\SERVERNAME\INSTANCENAME\DBNAME\, apparently the only folder you have to copy over from the old server after doing a fresh install on a new server, would be DBNAME. So I did that again and ran the dmconfig again, which apparently isn't really necessary also, since that has all been setup when I installed document server, still wouldn't work. I then ran an office detect and repair on the clients and it started to work on them! Still not working on the server (I'm gussing since that only has word and excel viewers installed although didn't someone say that it should work with just viewers?) but who cares. So it's sorted at one school. So for that particular error (relating to classid's) running the office repair fixed it. Still can't really figure out why though, must be something in office or sims, that relates particularly to the other, and has the old servername, instance name, docstorage location, etc, in it's settings...?


Now at another school with a similar problem after a server reinstall, I tried running the office repair but it's making no diffence at this school since it's the one with the:
"Error: The system cannot find the file specified" error, or something similar that basically says that the specified report you are trying to run is not on the document management server. Yet some of the other reports do run! I've run dmconfig on this one as well, pointing it to the right location but again this step has made no difference.
One thing I did find quite useful from support was that to test whether the back and front ends of doc management server are actually communicating at all or whether it's more of a simple issue on the client related to office, etc, is to just preview the report, that way if it won't even preview (like with the server I'm working on now, some custom reports won't even preview) you know it's not office that's at fault. I didn't even see or think of that option since I don't use sims!

I'll have a look at those KB's.

@LazyD It's true, you only need the dbname folder and it should work fine, as long as the new path is correct, and of course the dbname is the same! The viewers on server should work, but maybe you need to reinstall sims on top again. I just install office on my server so it can be used for testing, though haven't done yet on my new one.

If one report works, then they all should, dmconfig isn't required. If it can't find the a report, then it's either not there or it's moved somehow. Try creating a new report, and seeing if that saves and works okay, and perhaps exporting a report to a student's linked documents area. Having some but not all the files could just be because the docstorage folder is older than the sims install, e.g. you create a new server take over docstorage, then a few days later restore a backup from live server to the new one you've made. Anything created in the interim would not be found.

I thought i'd seen that Error message when stuff doesn't work with individual reports due to windows profiles / permissions, but maybe not.

If a preview doesn't work, then there's something wrong with the report itself, but not the docstorage, because the preview should i think just pull in the data and not do anything with it, not even look for the associated display template.

let us know how you get on.

Thanks for reply vikpaw.

Well I think it basically sorted now, but not totally to mine, or the users satisfaction.

The problem with the error I posted a pic of at the start of this thread is related to the office installation on the machine trying to run the report (as many of you said). After messing about for a while on one of the clients that were getting this error I ran a detect and repair on office and the reports ran successfully. I don't really understand this, perhaps some setting in the local office installation and/or sims installation references the sims server name? And when this was changed to the new server name it didn't work, but the detect and repair reset this? I don't know, and I wasn't happy with capita not being able to tell me why despite this being what should be for them a simple problem to solve. Getting a bit tired with that now.

The other problem of some reports coming up with "Error: the system cannot find the file specified" is also unexplained, capita have just said that it's because it's not on the document server. However, If some of the reports that I have copied over work, and some do not, and what I have copied over is definitely everything from the old document server, then I don't understand how these particular reports that won't run are not on the new server. The ones that do not run are old capita reports that have not be updated for years, they ran fine on the old server a couple of weeks ago but now not. There are new reports that do the same or very similar function and we have been just telling the school to use those instead and then removing the reports that don't work from the front end in design mode.

Obviously this doesn't really explain why those reports don't work though when they did on the new sever before the migration, no one seems to know!

I've not refreshed my mind of the whole thread, but just trying to think of something that fits what you have described for the second situation, if you had an old server with old built-in reports and they work, then you move to a new server, update it to latest sims, import latest reports, then copy over the docstorage, then the templates it wants to find wont be there as they may have been overwritten.

Sometimes when fiddling with reports, the templates can go a bit awry, and the same template gets associated with multiple reports or a report just loses it's link. It's weird and used to happen a lot, but was never easily recreated in test conditions. I know that at one point, just opening a report in design mode by one of my users would break it. More recently, prior to Office 2010 support, someone with the 2010 trying to redesign an old report would also break it, until it was resaved with Office 2003/7.

For the first error, there isn't anything in office that is linked to the sims servername, however if something in office did get corrupted, then sims could and would struggle to make it's connections and process it's reports. Re-installing office should probably have been part of the initial troubleshooting. I know a while back there was an issue with a windows update to Office that caused some problems for some people, and they had to revert.

The main thing is you're working again, it's probably for the best that they get used to the newer reports, as they'll be the ones that get updated next time.