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ottobockFlag for United States of America

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MAC OSX Client Leaves Many "Open Files" on Windows File Storage Server

Hello,
We've got a few Mac stations that access file/folder shares on a Windows 2008 Server.

The issue is that some Mac's set a lock when the file is opened, but have trouble releasing/closing the lock after closing the files.

This seems to have started becoming more prevelant in the past few months. Anyone else notice this? Any recent update to the OSX, or even Windows, that may cause this? Any known OSX software that may be to blame? These stations are mostly used for Marketing applications such as Adobe InDesign, PhotoShop, etc...

Side note: I'm a Windows administrator, so questions involving the Mac stations will be a little more difficult to me. I'm mostly interested if others are seeing this issue.

Thanks!
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Xaelian
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Do you know what version of Mac OS X these clients are using?
File locking is something that everyone has in MAC/Windows environment. Because Windows and Mac are different in so many ways.

I know that With snow leopard. Adobe documents opened from a SMB share on a Mac (what you're doing) causes a lot of trouble. I've even saw it happen on Lion.

That's why I use this workaround.

If you open a file on your Mac and you want to save it, save it with a unique filename, or saving locally and then copying to the server.

It is a good idea (although maybe not feasible depending on the environment) to avoid having more than one user working on files in the same folder. Photoshop has a number of problems when saving over a network and this is just one you may encounter. Adobe specifically does not support saving over the network. Adobe has a product called Version Cue specifically for managing shared files and file versioning. So I would use the workaround to avoid major issues.
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Thanks for the info!
I read around the internet a bit, and got some hints that other environments had this problem too. I think you've confirmed this for me. :-)

I've asked the main user what version: 10.6.8 snow leopard (?)

They are planning to update both the OSX and Adobe CS very soon. Think it will help with this issue??

Regarding the workaround, I'm not sure this is possible. I know they are OK at ensuring only 1 user accesses a folder at a time, but what's happening is the same user is opening a folder, accessing some files with Adobe software (locks created), and saving/closing and then noticing they cannot move/edit/etc the same files they just opened. So they lock themselves out. :-( I'm not sure there is really another workaround, as they manage a TON of data and folders, and I don’t want to bring this data local or offer up too much of a convoluted approach. Strange though that it started really becoming noticeable within the past month or so... I wonder if a Windows update could be to blame...
An update of os x and adobe could resolve it. But with the experience I have with the file locking problem. You only got a 40% chance that it will fix if.

This is something I hate about mac/windows environment.
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Xaelian
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Much-much-much appreciated. ;-)