Data Source

[frank]

Hello.

I have a document that is attached to an ODBC data source. Almost all the
time when the document is opened the attachment to the datasource exists.
Once in a while the attachment to the datasource is broken and I get the
message that it's a mailmerge document and word can't find the datasource.
I'll close the document then re-open it and the link will be fine. Can
anybody tell me why this would be happening? I'm on Windows 2000 SP4 and
Office XP SP3, However this has also happened with Win XP and Office 2003.

Thanks,
Frank

 

[Peter Jamieson]

I don't know the answer (once set up, ODBC connections seem pretty stable)
but...
a. what is the data source?
b. is the data source on another system (i.e. on a remote machine on a
network) ?
c. ODBC connections to "file" type data sources such as delimited text
files, Excel files etc. are likely to fail if the file is "in use" by
something else and is not designed for multi-user operation - for example,
you can probably work with an Access .mdb on your machine, and successfully
use it as an ODBC data source in Word but if your data source is an Excel
file and it's open in Excel, Word will probably fail to open it.

Peter Jamieson

 

[frank]

Peter:
a. The data source is an MS query to retrieve from a DB2 file on an IBM
Iseries via ODBC.

b. The data would be on a remote system (Iseries)

c. The data file would not be in use.

Frank

 

[Peter Jamieson]

Frank,

Regret I can't test Iseries/DB2 here. (Actually I used to keep up with IBM
but hadn't realised IBM had moved from "AS400" to "Iseries" )

When the connection fails, if you re-connect manually does the connection
always succeed? if so, despite the fact that I have almost no evidence to go
on (other than a lack of similar comments related to other ODBC drivers) my
gut feeling is that there could be a timing or timeout problem somewhere -
either in the time it takes to establish a network connection to the
Iseries, or to whatever process the Iseries ODBC driver connects to. If you
look at the ISeries ODBC driver settings (i.e. in the ODBC administrator),
what values are you able to set in there?

Peter Jamieson

 

[frank]

After the connection fails, if I reopen the document it always succeeds.
Theres not much in the ODBC settings. I use SQL package support, read only
access.

FYI - the AS/400 is being renamed all the time. I guess now its actually an
IBM System i5.

Frank

 

[Peter Jamieson]

Well, I cannot prove it but it really does sound like a timeout problem -
i.e. the first time you try to connect, it takes too long and Word gives up.
Another possibility is that Word/ODBC is doing something which causes the
AS/400 to reject logon informatin first time around.

I had a look at the Technical support site for the System i5 and searched
for "odbc" and then "odbc word". I seemed to have to create an account to
get at the specifics for each article, which I'm not about to do. Probably
worth your while to have a look through that lot and see if anything strikes
a chord.

Is there an OLEDB provider for the System i5 and if so, do you have it on
your system? Can you try that instead?

Peter Jamieson