HomePath (My Documents) files turned into .tmp files

Running server 2003 and having
'Documents' folder point to our file server via Homepath in AD.

Friday I
deselected 'Move the contents of Documents to the new location.' in an attempt
to resolve an account pointing to an old location.

This morning I
recieved multiple calls stating documents have disappeared and/or have been
renamed and are now .tmp files. Strangley some are defaulted to open with Adobe
reader.

I had changed back the GPO setting, thinking this had to do with
the issue; relating to the timing of change vs the report of issue. This didnt
help.

I then tried to restore via backup, but when I explore the restore,
it shows the same tmp files.

Am I viewing Backup Exec incorrectly? What
can I do to resolve this situation?

Find more posts tagged with

Free for TechExams community: Cybersecurity salary guide

Compare cert salaries and plan your next career move

Button

Comments

elTorito

If you rename one of these .tmp files to .doc (I assume that they were previously Word documents), can you open them that way?

SouthSeaPirate

Unfortunately I do not know which is which. They not only changed extension but also the name. No way this could be done manually as there are hundreds of files.

My other issue is why Backup Exec is showing current files rather than whats on the tape (even when viewing by media). How can I view this?

And last but not least; why the hell is Win7 renaming everything to 'Documents'?

undomiel

Sounds like you're seeing .tmp files from offline files on the redirection. I'd first check on whether your GPO for redirection is applying to the user accounts properly then move on to verifying permissions on your folders. This would be a good document to reference: Folder Redirection: Group Policy

crrussell3

As undomiel stated, the fr****.tmp files are related to offline files and redirection. As for the user folders being renamed all to "Documents", that is a WVista/W7/W8 issue. In order to keep that from happening, you need to do the following:

Share -> username -> Documents

Then your gpo needs to be pointed to the full \\share\username\documents for redirected path. This preserves the username folder at the root level. Otherwise, you can run a reoccuring scheduled task to delete the desktop.ini file from all user folders and that will revert the name back. But you have to keep doing that. So best thing to do is setup the folder structure properly now. I had a scheduled task to do that pre-migration to dfs. Works, but its a bandaid fix.

Also make sure your permissions are setup 100% per that link above.

EDIT - Verify how this setting is configured: Computer Configuration > Windows Components > Windows Explorer > Verify old and new Folder Redirection targets point to the same share before redirecting and how it might impact your environment. This could explain the deleted files.

SouthSeaPirate

crrussell3 wrote: »

As undomiel stated, the fr****.tmp files are related to offline files and redirection. As for the user folders being renamed all to "Documents", that is a WVista/W7/W8 issue. In order to keep that from happening, you need to do the following:

Share -> username -> Documents

Then your gpo needs to be pointed to the full \\share\username\documents for redirected path. This preserves the username folder at the root level. Otherwise, you can run a reoccuring scheduled task to delete the desktop.ini file from all user folders and that will revert the name back. But you have to keep doing that. So best thing to do is setup the folder structure properly now. I had a scheduled task to do that pre-migration to dfs. Works, but its a bandaid fix.

Also make sure your permissions are setup 100% per that link above.

EDIT - Verify how this setting is configured: Computer Configuration > Windows Components > Windows Explorer > Verify old and new Folder Redirection targets point to the same share before redirecting and how it might impact your environment. This could explain the deleted files.

Documents point to [URL="file://\\server\share\username"]\\server\share\username[/URL] (username is the top directory for My Documents). Not sure how it could be any other way. What am I missing here?

I believe we are solved in the tmp area issue. I believe it was 'Move the contents of Documents to the new location' setting. I had changed this trying to fix another issue (below).

Here are my GPO settings as they are now:

Now my new issue is 'You need Admin permission' or this folder 'is read only' when navigating/browsing to My Documents. This happens when the user uses Outlook to attach a file from docs, save a file to docs via Excel, or any other way when browsing. To make it even stranger, they can open docs, drag and drop, create new, delete. They can even attach in Outlook as long as they do not navigate; just drag and drop. This is random users which have the exact same persmissions as anyone else.

crrussell3

You can set their Home Folder Path to something such as: \\server\share\username\Documents

This will mean their My Documents is located in a folder called "Documents" inside of their username folder in the share. This gets rid of the display name change issue.

Can you post your NTFS/Share permissions of a user who has the issue and one that hasn't (I know you said they are the same but lets look anyways). Use icacls to **** the ntfs permissions as below:

icacls foldername\* /save acl-foldername /T

SouthSeaPirate

How would I do this and migrate all the files? Also, the top directory is also showing up 'Documents'; not just for the users. I should also mention that this is only happening to users of Win7.

As for permissions; I have no idea how to use that command (Invalid Parameter).

All users have full control of their docs on our file server. I cant see how this is a permissions issue if they can still access it by other means. Almost seems Office related.

I have noticed that all these directories are indeed listed as read only. Unchecking it does nothing as it comes back checked.

SouthSeaPirate

crrussell3 wrote: »

You can set their Home Folder Path to something such as: \\server\share\username\Documents

This will mean their My Documents is located in a folder called "Documents" inside of their username folder in the share. This gets rid of the display name change issue.

Can you post your NTFS/Share permissions of a user who has the issue and one that hasn't (I know you said they are the same but lets look anyways). Use icacls to **** the ntfs permissions as below:

icacls foldername\* /save acl-foldername /T

Revisiting this.

As of now, I would like to fix the renaming to 'Documents' issue...

How can I apply this change, and how can I apply said change without messing up anyone documents?

Do I have to go to each profile on AD and change the path? Will the directory autmotically create and will the files automatically move to this directory?

crrussell3

Short version: script script script.

Long version: This is going to take some leg work. Personally, I would find an evening where you can get full access to the Users share. I would write a script to move all their current files/folders into a "Documents" folder (or whatever you want to call it) that you create with the script. You will have to make sure they don't have an existing Documents folder, otherwise things won't look the same to the end users. Then write another script to change all the AD profiles to point to the new location. The users shouldn't notice a difference in the end when accessing their files, as "My Documents" will still point to the correct location, the same if you map a network drive to it (just don't forget to change the path here also depending on how you map it).