Problems opening MS Office documents via OSX Lion

[avalp]

I have recently upgraded to OS X Lion and am experiencing a strange problem when trying to open MS Office documents on the NAS. Was wondering if others had seen this or could suggest what the problem might be...

When trying to open a MS Word or MS Excel document stored on the NAS I get an error similar to the one below:

'home:Documents:Workbook1.xslx' could not be found

However if I open any document on the local hard disk then there are no problems. I am also able to copy files from the NAS onto the desktop and then open them but just not directly from the NAS. Permissions on the NAS are ok as I am able to copy files to it ok. This issue is only with Office documents as text files or PDF docs open ok.

I have uninstalled and re-installed Office, also tried rebooting the NAS and stopping/starting network services but still no luck.

I am running DSM 3.1 (latest patch) on a DS411 and have confirmed that I am connected to the NAS using Samba. Running MS Office 2011.

[autonumous]

Yep seeing the same, although im getting this on both Lion (10.7) and Snow Leopard (10.6.. If i copy teh file to another share, opens fine, or use quickview.

Really really annoying

using DSM 3.2.
Not sure if its Synology NAS or some recent update by apple with both 10.6.8 and 10.7.

[westport]

I am having the same problem. Apparently this is a know issue by Microsoft but they are are in rush to fix. I read an article that said a fix will arrive in months not days. That translates to years not weeks in human speak. From what I understand, the bug has to do with compatibility of Lion and Word 2011 Mac and will occur on any NAS. The only work around is to copy the file to you hard disk before opening it and then copy back up to NAS after you save changes on your hard drive.

Macs are so easy and intuitive aren't they.

[tarredlog]

The error message I receive is a little different, but essentially the same: "Word cannot open this document. The document might be in use, the document might not be a valid Word document, or the file name might contain invalid characters (for example,|?).

My take is that the problem is MS Office gets confused between the "home" directory on the Mac HD and the "home" directory on the Synology. If you move the file to a different shared directory other than "home" on the Synology, you can open the file in Word. (Note, if you are logged in as admin in DSM, home will appear as user names under the "homes" shared directory.)

[avalp]

Thanks for the feedback.

For anyone that's facing similar problems I just got around this problem by accessing the files through /homes/<username>/<filename> instead of /home/<filename> which seems to be ok for my purposes.

westport, I don't suppose you have a link to the article you mentioned?

Just wanted to look out for a fix from M$ (I won't be holding my breath though)...

[oldenboom]

At the microsoft website I found:
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/mac/forum/macoffice2011-macword/why-are-my-files-getting-locked-read-only/8eba1a20-3303-4c18-ba07-a9037fa89f39?tab=MoreHelp

[gustrance]

Same problem happening here, can't open any Office document that is in the Synology server that Office says it is locked and therefore can only be opened in Read Mode... The link posted above was of October 25, 2011. So far, almost 3 months, no solution? Everything is updated here, DSM, Mac OS X Lion and Office. Who is responsible for fixing that?

[solomfb]

For anyone that's facing similar problems I just got around this problem by accessing the files through /homes/<username>/<filename> instead of /home/<filename> which seems to be ok for my purposes.

This worked for me, not sure if anyone else on our server has this problem? But, I'm the admin so I can access the /homes/ directory, so other would only be able to access /home/ I believe, so this isn't an actual fix, just a work around.

Hope they get it fixed.

[westport]

Just upgraded to SP2 on Mac Office 2011. Still having problems:

Now using word: 14.2.0 (120402)
Lion version: Mac OS X Lion 10.7.3 (11D50b)
Synology Version: DS-209+II Build 4.0- 2198

I have renamed my share to main.
So my share is called \\DS\main

I store all my word docs on a directory called \\DS\main\docs.
I have 5 user logins on my mac, each person has their own Synology login.

If I reboot the Mac, then login to any user. I can open up a file on \\DS\Main\Docs from Word and Save it.
If I then switch users and log in as someone else and try to open any file in the same directory (not even the same file I had previously opened) I get an error. The error occurs even if I log off the first user.

Here is the exact wording of the error in Word.
"Word Cannot open this document. The document might be in use, the document might not be a valid word document, or the filename might contain invalid characters (for example \/). Test.Doc."

What the heck is going on? I have no problems at all accessing files on the NAS in Word from my PCs. My only work around at this point on the Mac is to copy the file to my Desktop, update it, save it, and then copy the file back up to the NAS again. This is a pain in the neck.

Synology, Apple, Microsoft, come on guys what is the problem here??????

[myCloud]

If I reboot the Mac, then login to any user. I can open up a file on \\DS\Main\Docs from Word and Save it.
If I then switch users and log in as someone else and try to open any file in the same directory (not even the same file I had previously opened) I get an error. The error occurs even if I log off the first user.

Don't use Fast User Switching. Try logging off the first user before logging on as the next user and you should not have these problems. I discovered yesterday trying to help someone the way the Mac handles network mounts during FUS is going to create problems.

[Loopi]

Since the problem appeared last year,

-Mac OSX was updated from 10.7 to 10.7.3
-MS Office 2011 was updated to 14.2.1
-DSM 4 was releases and got some updates to 4.0-2219

and the problem yet still persists. This is not funny anymore.

Can we expect any fix any time or do we have to live with this situation, that the home-Share for AFP is working well but not with MS Office? No word from either Apple, Microsoft or Synology on this until today.

[myCloud]

Since the problem appeared last year,

-Mac OSX was updated from 10.7 to 10.7.3
-MS Office 2011 was updated to 14.2.1
-DSM 4 was releases and got some updates to 4.0-2219

and the problem yet still persists. This is not funny anymore.

What problem? (besides the Fast User Switching above)

[jltnol]

I'd like to add to the chorus...

In my case, FileMaker Pro docs won't open as well. I can copy them to the desktop and they work just fine, but can't open them directly on the server.

Also, FileMaker Pro cannot SAVE a document on the server either... I get an error message..

Now, PAGES... can both open and save documents on the server... don't know what the diff is... but... it is a problem

[nickd]

I also have this problem on Lion 10.7.4 / Office 2011 14.2.2 / DSM 4.0-2228.
With the same office and dsm is does work on a Snow Leopard 10.6.8 !!

But I created a workaround for our Lion clients:

1)
added a new share in /usr/syno/etc/smb.conf :
[personal]
invalid users=nobody,nobody
valid users=%U
comment="Personal Disk"
path=/var/services/homes/
write list=nobody,@users,nobody
writeable=yes
2)
And give all user directories chmod 700, so users can't read each others personal disk


It's strange that Snow Leopard works, but Lion doesn't.
I know AFP got an upgrade, but on a custom fileserver with the same netatalk install (2.2.2) and home directories shared with the AppleVolumes.default config file it does work on Lion, but than the shared name is not 'home' but the username.

[coolspot]

Still no fix for the Home directory issue and Microsoft Word 2011?