HCL Domino 12.0.2: removed user-maildatabase in a cluster symmetry configuration is repaired after removed from 1 server.

In HCL Domino 12.0.2 we discovered that when we delete users, some maildatabases are repaired back to the home/mail Domino server……running on Windows servers.

Like all of you know, when removing a user from a clustered Domino environment, the cldbdir entry for that database is altered to REPAIR:DISABLED. Repair is not allowed for that database. We raised a ticket because we noticed, ofcourse, that this was not the case for some users we removed. The database was repaired from another clustermember. This left us with 2 maildatabases and NO persondocument.

After 3 weeks of trying several debug parameters we ended up to adminp and the cldbdir process as the cause of this problem. Normally, Windows is NOT case sensitive and you can use different casing in folder or filenames. When your mailfile is called MAIL\mail.nsf, you can enter in your persondocument mail\MAIL.nsf and it’s all working fine.

HCL support discovered that the check for the existence of the database in cldbdir, is case sensitive …. also on Windows. There was a code change for some reason ( or a mistake….who knows ).

What went wrong on our site? With the introduction of a new IM system, all users are now created with the MailFile path as uppercase, while the folder on Windows is lowercase. For normal operations this is not a problem.

HCL support identified that as a problem and will deliver a fix for it. But we couldn’t wait for it and we did the following to resolve the problem:

1. changed the tool, so the newly registered users are in the correct casing (lowercase )
2. took down the Domino server and renamed all mail\* files to lowercase
3. created an agent to change all persondocuments to lowercase:

FIELD MailFile := @LowerCase(@GetField("MailFile")); 

We have tested this and the problem is gone. When we remove a user now, adminp change that entry in cldbdir to REPAIR:DISABLED and cluster symmetry is NOT repairing this database.

We are planning to move all Windows based Domino servers to Docker Linux, so at some point we had to do the above actions anyway.

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