Tech Info 095: Data corruption using Apple XSan 1.2

HELIOS Tech Info #095

Tue, 24 Jan 2006

Data corruption using Apple XSan 1.2

Recently we received feedback from HELIOS partners and customers that clients connected to HELIOS servers using Apple XSan 1.2 file systems showed indications of intermittent data corruption.
Symptoms are that files can not be opened after Save, or show partial old content. Among the affected applications are Adobe Photoshop, InDesign, and Quark XPress.
Another symptom are system messages from the “desksrv” process, like “node does not belong to index” which indicate corrupted database contents.
From a “ktrace” dump of a “pcshare” process a partner could provide, it became clear that contents of a data file were written correctly by HELIOS.  But after the application from the same SMB client did close, reopen and then read the content in again, this was in part the old content of the file.
As these problems may not be recognized by users every time they occur, it would be safest not to use XSan 1.2 as a file system.
HELIOS has reported this to Apple who is currently investigating this issue.
We recommend that every customer who encounters this Xsan data corruption problem reports this bug to Apple.
When a workaround or fix is available, this information will be distributed by a follow up to this Tech Info.