Weirdity

[D. J.]

Hi all,

 

I haven't seen this problem posted as yet, but I'm going to relate the saga just in case it ever comes up.

 

I'm admin for several websites here at TCH (I bring all my customers here). I got a call one day last May from one of my folks saying that they were having a problem opening some attachments in their Squirrel Mail accounts. When they'd click the attachment, the little papers would fly like they were supposed to, but they never stopped - even if the file was small - and the file never opened.

 

It had started the day before and was intermittant. One minute things would open fine, the next they wouldn't. It also seemed to migrate from work station to work station.

 

So I logged in from my place, but I didn't have any trouble at all.

 

A couple days later, before we'd nailed this part down, they called again. Now when they clicked an attached file, they got a separate pop-up window asking for a user name and password. This was not a sq-mail window. They tried entering every name/pass they had, but nothing would work. Again, this was only on some work stations. By the next day though, it was on more, and by the end of that week, no one could open attachments.

 

Then they narrowed it down for me a bit more. It was only a problem with Excel and Word attachments. The thing was, I could sit here and open these things until the cows came home and then have the cows open them. Another weird thing, if the user forewarded the message to an outside webmail account (like hotmail) everything opened fine.

 

Anyway, by now I'd submitted a support ticket and TCH had done a test. They didn't have a problem either, and we determined that, whatever it was, the trouble wasn't here or with Sq-mail. My guess was that it was something in their in-house network that was glitchy. I told my customer my hands were tied, so they went on a trial and error hunt for the cause themselves.

 

I'll spare you all the gory details, but ultimately they called a tech down the street from them, who also happens to run the local branch of their ISP. He looked, he tried this & that, and was as stumped as the rest of us in the end. Later, this guy contacted the ISP's main office to pick their brains about it.

 

As it turned out, the main office said they had another customer, located where they were, with the exact same problem.

 

That didn't solve anything, but at least it was a start. Now, they had a basis from which to work. All they had to do was find out what these two customers, who were a great distance away from each other, had in common. That was the last we heard, and that was weeks ago.

 

Then yesterday, the boss at my client's business finally went to see this tech again to try and get an answer. Well, it appears the only thing they and the other person have in common is the ISP! The tech admitted that they now have several other customers right here in town that are starting to have the same thing happen.

 

I don't know if this ISP has figured out what's wrong. I don't know that they'll be honest about it if and when they do, but it's definitely their baby. Whatever it is, it starts intermittant, and also seems to mutate as time goes by.

 

I don't think giving the name of this ISP would be in good taste, but I will say that everyone concerned is in southern Ohio.

 

This was such a weird one, I thought I should post it here in case TCH gets any complaints of this nature. If and when these people figure out what causes this (and if they'll tell me) I'll be more than happy to pass it along here.