InfoPath Dev

Hi -

I'm working on a project where we serve up our XSN to our users via the URL in the InfoPath PI.  The URL goes to an actual internet domain, and we are not using Sharepoint in this workflow in any way.

My employer has just change the company name, and plans to retire the server where our XSN file is currently located.  However, we have quite a few XML files "in the wild" (i.e., production), that would be orphaned by such a change.

Our discussions about handling the change resulted in the following questions:

1. Can the PI href URL to an InfoPath 2003 Sp1 form be redirected from the original URL without hard coding the redirect in the href itself?

For instance, if our current URL is http://www.current.com/our.xsn, and our future URL will be http://otherprocess.future.com/our.xsn

2. Will InfoPath continue to open the forms if the http://www.swlearning.com URL is redirected to the new server?

We want to avoid actually changing the URLs in our production XML files - that is, we want to leave the http://www.current.com URL in place in the InfoPath PI href, and have the redirect to http://otherprocess.future.com/our.xsn done on the server-side.

3. What security implications might we encounter if it is possible to do a server-side redirect? Would it just be a matter of adding an additional server to our trusted intranet zones?

4. If InfoPath 2003 SP1 cannot handle a server-side URL redirect to find the XSN file, can it handle a hard-coded redirect - that is, if we wanted to redirect, would we have to write this redirect into all of our current XML files? Hard-coding a redirected URL doesn't make that much sense to me, since we could just swap in the correct URL since we're changing the XML, anyway.  Is there any reason to ever do a hard-coded URL redirect in an InfoPath form?

Thanks in advance for any information you can provide regarding these questions.

Jean Kaplansky
XML Architect
Cengage Learning
Global Production and Manufacturing
Executive Woods, 5 Maxwell Drive
Clifton Park, New York 12065

 Email: [email protected]

 Web: http://www.cengage.com
 

Jean - Welcome to the forum!

So are you thinking about using a redirect in IIS to keep the old URL still active?

I have not tried this but I would think it might work.

I will do some research.

Hi Clay - Thanks for the welcome.

The way we implement the redirect will depend on what works best for InfoPath.  We would like to take the simplest path from point A to point B, but we do have some flexibility in explaining our application-based requirement to our network powers-that-be, and asking them to implement in a specific manner so long as they are OK with the security side of things.

I would love to be able to try the IIS redirect myself, but unfortunately do not have that kind of access to servers at my company.  Anything you can do to help me identify the best way to proceed will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks again,

Jean

Well, it looks like I found out what happens when you try to use a redirected URI to find the form's XSN...

You get a message stating:

"This form cannot be opened because it requires the domain permission level and it currently has restricted permission. To fix this problem, open the form from the location it was published to."

This leaves me with the question: Where do I need to change the security to domain permission level - in the XSN file itself, or in the .NET configuration of the Windows Server hosting the domain?

Followed by the next question:  will changing either the XSN's security to domain permission level or the Windows Server hosting the domain actually make it so the form will open?

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

 If anyone has been following this, I actually came across a much easier solution than changing either the form's security, or the server's security.

 I republished the form to reflect the proper URI with no redirection.  There was much cache cleaning and teeth gnashing in between, but I now have a form that will open.
 

You beat me to the answer Jean. :) That was my idea.

Good work!