Every time SMSDOM runs a scan, it seems to modify every document that contains an attachment, in every Notes database on the server. In a clustered environment, this problem can create a “replication storm” because one server updates the document, replicates it to other servers in the cluster, then those servers modify the document, and the process continues. On my servers, it created thousands of replication conflicts.
Cause of the problem:
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SMSDOM is not “cluster aware”
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A “cool” new setting called “Secure Scanning Optimization.” This must have been designed by some clown at Symantec who doesn’t understand how Domino works. What does it do? It adds a field (X-SSOTag) to every document that it scans. Why? This field tells SMSDOM that the document has already been scanned. So if a document is sent to 100 users, it only gets scanned once instead of 100 times.
Why is this flawed?
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Duh! Modifying every document (regardless of the reason) breaks replication!
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It makes sense to scan an email only once, instead of once for every recipient. But it doesn’t make sense to use an email-tracking mechanism for existing documents. I’m curious what the Symantec clowns think they gain by such methods. If I forward an existing document, it gets put into a new message without the internal tracking-field, thereby making that field useless.
How can you avoid this problem?
Change your SMSDOM settings to disable “Secure Scanning Optimization.”
How can Symantec fix this?
Change the process so that X-SSOTag is only used for documents that come into mail.box and for real-time scans; DO NOT use that process for scheduled scans!