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Problem with ADODB.stream with Windows XP Home

Our internet-based software uses the ADODB.Stream to load a text file to the client computer in order to generate client-side forms in Microsoft Word. This works fine in Windows 2000 and XP Pro. On Windows XP Home however, the same event doesn't universally run at all. The only problem that we ran across all Microsoft platforms was the Microsoft update that disables the ADODB.Stream event from Internet Explorer. That was resolved with a simple registry hack to the ActiveX compatibility for Internet Explorer. Here is where it gets weirder though... this event runs fine on all of our company PCs running XP home. Is there anything that we are over looking that could possibly block this event?

One possibility that we were tossing around was possibly interference from viruses that attacked the system. Theoretically, if a virus used this event to propagate or infect, then a virus scanner would then have the authority to block that event from running. Another idea that we had was maybe interference from the Windows Firewall. If the ADODB.Stream was damaged or changed, how do we fix that or correct the problem.

Asta Cu

From what I've seen, this problem arises in the order updates are done. Which version of XP Pro and how current is W2K with service packs? This may shed some light.
XPE QFE: Critical Update for Microsoft Data Access Components - Disable ADODB.Stream object from Internet Explorer (KB870669)
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=57d20041-5e13-4c3e-aa21-4fae794f8262&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=4d056748-c538-46f6-b7c8-2fbfd0d237e3&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=57d20041-5e13-4c3e-aa21-4fae794f8262&displaylang=en

More shortly. Admin access?

Asta Cu

This is one of many reasons to disable the stream...
Download.Ject Payload Detection and Removal Tool
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;873018

Asta Cu

"Word Cannot Obtain The Data..." Error Message When Programmatically Embedding an OLE Object
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;819031

Asta Cu

For XP Pro, of course; especially if SP2 .... firewall and ports at issue.

Also, maybe a workaround here, until others step in with more help?
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/21139981/Visual-Basic-RunTime-Error-2114.html?query=adodb.stream+windows+xp&clearTAFilter=true

officerhandsome

ASKER

We are all running W2k version 5.00.2195 with SP4 and EE version 6.0.2800.1106

All with Admin rights, and firewall setup correctly. We weren't aware that there were more than one updates that effected the ADODB.stream so we will look into those other two and get back to you. What's strange, is the fact that no Windows XP Home versions will run this, and all but 1 of our W2k PC's work. All W XP Pro machines run it just fine. We will check and re-check the version settings on all pc's and see if there is a tie between all that.

Thanks for the help.

Asta Cu

Wish I knew more about this, and keep hoping someone will be here when I return say OH it is ____! It's a real baffler to me. Do you suppose MDAC plays a role here in any way?
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=6c050fe3-c795-4b7d-b037-185d0506396c&DisplayLang=en

If it were just one XP Home system with the problem, I'd recommend doing a system file check (sfc /scannow) to see if integral system files are corrupted or missing, but that's not the case. I'm really at a loss. Will keep my thinking cap on and dig a bit deeper when time permits. Not my area of expertise, as I come to see.

Asta Cu

Downloader.Psyme is a Trojan horse that downloads and executes a file. It uses a known exploit of ADODB stream objects in Microsoft Internet Explorer.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/downloader.psyme.html

Just one of many found that exploit the ADODB.stream objects.

officerhandsome

ASKER

We thought that MDAC was the culprit today too. So we tried to upgrade to 2.8, didn't work. We thought that Win XP Home didn't have MDAC installed, but you can't install V 2.8 onto a Win XP Home machine without getting an error saying it's already installed. We checked the firewall's with no luck. I'm really stuck too! I felt like we were on the trail with MDAC but something is still missing. We did the registry hack to set the ADODB.Stream back to work after the critical update #KB870669 but that hasn't helped either. And what complicates things further, is that one of our techs tried to run the app from his Win XP Home PC and it worked fine! So there is something missing in our setup or something that is affecting certain PC's and not affecting others.

We'll keep hacking away at it and all of us will hopefully walk away with some greater knowledge after this one.....

officerhandsome

ASKER

Here is one of our error screens we are getting after the application fails. This is found by double clicking the "Done, but with errors!" message at the bottom left corner of our browser.

Line: 18
Char: 1
Error: Could not complete the operation due to error 80040e09.
Code: 0

I'm not sure if this helps any, but we also explored the origin of that error code and it didn't seem to really take us any where.

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Asta Cu

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Asta Cu

Looks, as a rule, to be write access attempt to read only item.

officerhandsome

ASKER

Ok, I have some new developements. Today I brought the laptop with XP Home to work that would not run the app. I checked all the Active X registry areas and found nothing wrong. I then setup a new pc at work with XP Home SP2 and all updates to XP and Word 2000 and the app ran perfectly. I thought maybe I missed something in the registry on the laptop so I imported the laptop registry for the Active X section to the PC and it still worked perfectly. I then checked the registry for IE and they are exactly the same. So that has been ruled out but still I haven't found a solution.

Just to add some more info; I am using trusted zones for the web site and have opened up all security on both the PC and the laptop. On the PC, I am getting a windows security prompt for the username and password on the webserver when the app requests the file from the server, but no prompt from the laptop. It looks as if the laptop isn't even requesting the file from the server. All PC's are in different network groups but are merely in the same building so I don't understand why I'm getting a username and password prompt from the server while attempting the app from the PC and not when I do it on the laptop.

Asta Cu

Difference most likely is the .Net framework.

officerhandsome

ASKER

Well we figured it out today. I checked the security of IIS and of the folder in my directory that was housing the merge macro file. It seems that the ADODB.stream uses the Internet Guest Account or IUSR_Webserver user to access files on the server when you use Anonymous Authentication so that any potential user of the system can access the merge file to run the app client side. Long story short, we check the security tab of the folder in the wwwroot file and that IUSR was not selected. The error we got which was the 80040e09 was trying to tell us to check the cross domain security and make sure that our user was able to pluck that file from the server's hard drive.

I hope that resolution makes sense for anyone else that uses this question in the future.

Thanks for all your time and help with this question.

Asta Cu

Thank you for the good news, and for adding the detail that will clearly help others who will now see this item in our PAQ (Previously Asked Questions) database. It has been an excellent learning adventure and I'm pleased I could collaborate with you on this.
Best wishes,
":0) Asta