SQL DB index replication

Sounds strange, but ... read here:

"Index changes are not propagated to Subscribers: if you drop a column at the Publisher and a dependent index is dropped, the index drop is not replicated. You should drop the index at the Subscriber before dropping the column at the Publisher, so that the column drop succeeds when it is replicated from the Publisher to the Subscriber. If synchronization fails because of an index at the Subscriber, manually drop the index and then rerun the Merge Agent."

You may have dropped an index (among other things) successfully at the publisher but it can't drop at the subscriber. Quite why it cames back on the publisher I don't know: are there any log events?

hth

Mike

what type of replication do you have?
..you may need to drop index on all "partners" DBs

Does this happen to a specific index, or to any index you drop on the source database? Can you use SQL Profiler to watch the instance and see when the index is recreated? You can filter the monitoring for just statements containing INDEX, so you'll get a timestamp when it happens - from there (and the details like workstation and login), you'll get some details about where it came from.

I'd suspect it's not related to replication at all, but that's a distraction - there's no reason I can think of why replication would alter the publishing database, and I'd look instead for a scheduled job of some kind that's recreating it.