MS Project file in Sharepoint marked as read-only
Hi,
We are experiencing the same problem as this person (http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=8011&SiteID=1). Even though no one has the project file open, MS Project says that the file is in use and is locked for editing (but no specific person is named, like when someone really has the file open). This happens even when I am the only one editing a MS Project file. After X number of minutes, the file can be opened in read-write mode again. This bug makes it practically impossible for us to use Sharepoint as it makes us re-saving documents in other filenames to be able to save the files, which means we could as well use a file system to save our documents in.
Now, my colleague has dug up a KB article (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;899709&sd=rss&spid=2528&FR=1), is this the issue that we are experiencing? If yes, when will this be fixed? The integration with sharepoint is as of now practically worthless with this bug.
[999 byte] By [
ThomasL] at [2007-12-20]
Never mind the crashing or closing down unexpectedly as the KB article seems to suggest. This is just a matter of closing the project file without incident and going to open it again. I'm not seeing this with other office documents. Can anyone give us a status on this being that this is the classic document stored on TFS portal -- and is even in the project templates?
Does this locking behavior happen when you open the document for editing through IE or is it specific to the Team Explorer integration with SharePoint?
I'm not exactly sure I'm interpreting your question correctly, but if you mean how I navigate to the document and open it, the problem occurs in any scenario. For example I just put our TFS project plan out in a sharepoint directory. Opened it through a mapped network drive; made an edit and closed it; Then I was not even able to open it for editing again from the same box logged in as the same user -- not to mention from another box different user.
If you mean does it behave this way for project plans that have not been synchronized with TFS, the answer is no. Those behave like any other office document.
Please see the description of a SharePoint "short term lock" in this forum post: http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=412003&SiteID=1.
The KB article you reference describes what happens when a short term lock is held on a document and the holder of that lock is unexpectedly terminated. If you have an environment where shutting down MS Project normally does not release the lock, I would say that we have a bug. I have posted a description of this problem to internal forums on SharePoint and so far have not had any responses that indicate that this is a known issue.
Please confirm:
- This only happens for MS Project documents
- This happens for more than one client machine in your environment
Please try this:
- Open Internet Explorer and browse http://<server>/sites/<project>
- Click through to a Document Library holding an MS Project file
- Float the mouse over the title of the document to display a dropdown control to the right of the title
- Click the dropdown control arrow to display a context sensitive menu for the document
Variation A:
- Select "Edit in Microsoft Office Project" (this takes a short term lock)
- Edit the document, save and close
- Try to open it from the same client and a different client
Variation B:
- Select "Check out"
- Go to Variation A
Confirmed:
- This only happens for MS Project documents that have been connected to a Team Project. Again, project files that have no connection to TFS behave well. (At least other documents we use don't have this issue.) I gotta believe that your referenced post is the same issue. Otherwise nobody would be using this product.
- This happens for every client machine in our enviornment
- Variation A and Variation B, both show the project as locked for edit after the steps (for the same user and for other users). The only difference is that in Variation B , if I attempt to check out the file after it was checked back in by user1, it says it is already checked out to user1 even though it was already checked back in AND it is locked for edit.
I seem to be experiencing the same sort of problem ... but my files seemed to be locked way longer than 10 minutes ... several days in fact. I'm trying various save, check-in options to perturb it from the locked condition .... so far without success. What should I do? I need to update my project plan.
Step1: To get you back up and running:
- Open a new project plan
- Click on Choose Team Project and connect to the TFS project that you are trying to edit the plan for.
- Put the empty (but connected plan) into some task related view like Gannt Chart. For your table choose "Team Explorer Full" and for your filter make sure "all tasks" are showing.
- Then open you current plan in read-only mode choosing the same view, table, and filter as above. Select all the tasks and copy them from the one to the other.
Step2: Now that your plan is updatable, find some place other than SharePoint to save your updatable plan. (Because I haven't heard of any doable workarounds of yet.) We use TFS version control, but you can use any network share or file share as well.
Hi,
Thanks.
We're not sure what we did - but we seemed to have resolved the problem.
I had been working through the portal view, so that I could check-out, edit, and then check-in my changing project plan.
The trick seems to be to operate through the explorer view.
When we first tried to edit the .mpp file, we got a message, locked for editing. We asked to be notified when it was free, we exited MS project, and we're promptly notified that the file was available for editing. We were offered a popup box and asked if we wanted to reconnect to the server. We selected this option, but it didn't seem to work.
We waited a while, then were able to open the project plan through the explorer view. (We postulated if things were 'locked' we might have to wait between 3 and 10 mins, depending on which symptoms of this bug are prevelant.
Thereafter we were able to operate through the portal view without any apparent problem so far.
We've decided to operate in the following way (if we get stuck):
i) check-out .mpp files through the portal view
ii) edit .mpp files through VSTS explorer view (save, publishing etc.) and (possibly) checkin on exiting MS project
iii) check-in with comments through portal view.
If any problems on opening .mpp file to edit, then close and wait at least 3 mins, and possibly 10.
Hopefully that sorts us out.
Cheers,
David
David, are you implying that so far you are
NOT consistently seeing the read-only issue if you check out the file through the portal view. Or are you saying you are just content to wait the 3 to 10 minutes if you have to go back into the plan after checking in?
dzimmy, what I am saying is that I was consistently, persistantly and only seeing the read-only issue through the portal view. I was permanently locked out of the file (or any related files created via 'save-as' from the oririginal) if I tired to access it through the portal view (from at least Friday through to yesterday, Wednesday, i.e. 5 days).
The read-only lock only 'went away' after I tried to edit the project file through VSTS explorer, and requesting to be notified when the file became free for editing, which it did immediately after I closed the MS project.
I then was given the option to access the file on the server. This request was not completed successfully by VSTS/Sharepoint.
However the upshot of my interactions was that the file was unlocked from its permanent locked state.
We subsequently saw the file to be locked when we tried to access it through the portal, but this lock only persisted for a few minutes (we left it 10 before trying to open it again).
I am not really that content to have to wait 3-10 mins before I can re-open a plan again after saving it ... but it's a lot better than when I thought I couldn't ever open the plan again.
Cheers
Bill, I have used your steps and this issue is _only_ reproduced when doing Variation A to a MS Project file that is connected to a Team Project in TFS!
My steps to repro this:
1. I opened the mpp "Development Project Plan" in a Team Project. Note that this file still hasn't been connected to a Team Project.
2. I entered a new task, saved and closed the file + MS Project
3. In the same IE window, I opened the mpp again.
4. No error msg, the file was editable.
So far, so good.
5. I connected the mpp to a Team Project
6. I gathered tasks from the Team Project, approx 60 tasks
7. I saved and closed the file + MS Project
8. In the same IE window, I opened the mpp again.
9. I got the "....is locked for editing" and no user name.
These repro steps seem to validate that this error is somewhere in the MS Project<->TFS integration.
By the way, I have tried other MS Office documents in version A, none repros this bug.
Regards,
Thomas L
I tried to reproduce this so we can debug what is happening, but I was unable to. Here are the steps I ran:
Edit Project without TFS:
1. Created an mpp in Project 2003
2. Uploaded the file to the SharePoint portal of a TFS
3. Checked out the file and made edits using "Edit in Microsoft Office Project"
4. Made a change to the project, but did not connect to TFS
5. Closed MS Project and checked in the file
6. Checked out the Project file again and opened it - it opened and was editable, as expected
Edit Project After Connecting to TFS:
1. Checked out the same MS Project file and opened it by selecting "Edit in Microsoft Office Project"
2. In Project, connected to a TFS server and imported All Tasks
3. Saved and closed MS Project and checked in the file
4. Checked out the same MS Project file and opened it by selecting "Edit in Microsoft Office Project" - there was no error message and the Project file opened and was editable
Was there anything specific in your setup or steps that I am missing?
Thanks,
Erin
Here are my steps to reproduce and all relavent information I could think of.
Client:
Windows XP Professional - 5.1 (Build 2600.xpsp_sp2_gdr050301-1519 : Service Pack 2)Internet Explorer - 6.0.2900.2180.xpsp_sp2_gdr.050301-1519
Microsoft Office Project Professional 2003 (11.2.2005.1801.15) SP2
Server:
Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition = Version 5.2 (Build 3790.srv03_sp1_rtm.050324-1447 : Service Pack 1)
Team Foundation Server: 8.0.50727.147
Windows Sharepoint: 11.0.6566.0
Current Windows user has the following Roles:
Team Foundation Server Roles: Project Administrator
SharePoint Roles: Administrator
Reporting Services Roles; Content Manager; My Reports; Publisher; Report Builder
Server: Administrators
Client: Adminisrators
- Restart Server
- Restart Client
- Start Microsoft Project 2003
- Enter in first line:
- Task Name: Testing Task, hit enter
- File -> Save
- Click "Desktop"
- Click "Save"
- File -> Exit
- Open Internet Explorer
- Type in path of server project in address bar (eg. http://servername/sites/projectname), hit enter
- Click "Documents" in side bar
- Click "Create Document Library"
- Click "document library"
- Name: TestLibrary
Description:
Navigation: Yes (default)
Document Version: No (default)
Document Template: "Microsoft Office Word document" - Click "Create"
- Click "Upload Document"
Overwrite existing file(s)?: checked (default) - Click "Browse"
- Click "Desktop"
- Select "Project1.mpp"
- Click "Open"
- Click "Save and Close"
- Click context dropdown for "Project1"
- Click edit in Microsoft Project
- Enter in "Testing Task 2" as second item
- File -> Save
- File -> Exit
- Refresh "Internet Explorer"
- This second edit just demonstrates things are working I think (Steps 29 to 33)
Click context dropdown for "Project1" - Click edit in Microsoft Project
- Enter in "Testing Task 3"
- File -> Exit
- Do you want to save changes to "Project1.mpp"? Click Yes
- Link to team foundation server made in this edit series
Click context dropdown for "Project1" - Click edit in Microsoft Project
- Team -> Choose Team Project
- Select team project
- Click "OK"
- Menus start to look strange, like Exit turns into [Exit/Exit and Return] when highlighted
File -> Save - File -> Exit
- Click context dropdown for "Project1"
- Click edit in Microsoft Project
Now I get:
File in Use
Project1.mpp is locked for editing.
I'm really stuck here, as this really halts all progress right now. Our project manager will really want to use Microsoft Project, but something is causing a lock. This locking has to be resolved. Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Joe
I've split this thread as the original is really old and the new question will be more visible in its own thread.
-Matt
