Domino/Notes Version: 14.0FP4
Operating System: Windows 11
Client (Notes version): 14.0FP4
Problem/Query:
We use the HCL Notes client to access our Domino servers, whether or not the VPN is connected. Lately, the company VPN started having issues and will periodically drop. This is an issue for our networking team. The problem I am facing is that the Notes clients gets confused and loses track of where the Domino server is and the user gets a “cannot find path to server” error.
I would like to add 2 connection documents to all users; one with an external IP address and one with an internal IP address, because the VPN is messing with DNS.
Is there a way to add these two connection documents to all Notes clients through a group policy? If so, can you please point me towards the documentation?
Hi qfilipowicz,
We need to ensure that your desktop policy is configured to set the correct home server. For your specific issue, please verify that your existing Location Document is configured to check multiple connection methods and is using the correct address.
If the primary Connection Document is for your mail server, you may consider creating two separate Connection Documents in the Domino Directory (names.nsf on the server) and ensure that they are accessible.
You may also refer to the following knowledge article for guidance:
How to create Connection Documents programmatically in HCL Notes Clients
https://support.hcl-software.com/csm?id=kb_article&sysparm_article=KB0077904
Please let me know if you have any questions or need further assistance.
-PJ
You can write some LotusScript code in the PostOpen of the mail DB template to check for/create the connection documents.
Alternatively, you can use DNS to do this without connection documents.
For example the public DNS for dominoserver.xxxx.com → your public IP address
your internal DNS for dominoserver.xxxx.com → your local IP address
We have had similar issues after our windows VPN was “upgraded”. If the VPN is turned on/off while Notes is running then Notes can’t connect and often crashes. We have been using the DNS method above. Maybe a second connection document would work better?
I would be interested to know if / how you resolve it.
We only have one Domino server for all mail and applications. This is what we had before the fix":
Everyone’s Connection document pointed to the URL of our server: appserver.companydomain.com
Once VPN failed or had some DNS issue, the Notes client couldn’t determine the IP address of that external URL
What we ended up doing is leave that Connection doc alone, but rather change the Location doc through Desktop Policy settings.
From Domino Address Book, go to People - Policies - Settings and open the DESKTOP settings policy. Under the Name Servers tab, we added the external IP address to the “Secondary TCP/IP Notes name server” field and set the “How to apply this setting” to Set Initial Value.
That got pushed down to all users’ Location docs and when we lose DNS for any reason, the client uses the external IP address in this field. Pretty simple and it seems to work for us.
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re “Secondary TCP/IP Notes name server”
good idea