Hello folks
I?m seeking help on a very strange problem with IE8. (the text is a bit long, for which I apologise)
I work in a professional association with over 80000 members. We have a site, with restricted member access via login. The site is based on Oracle IAS 10G . Over the past few months, more and more members are unable to access it. They enter the basic site ok, then, after they enter the login/password and click to submit, they get 404-page not found errors. The users that have this problem have 2 and only 2 things in common:
– they have IE8
– they have recently (as in, the last 1-2 days) ran Windows Update.
The problem started somewhere around February/March. Anyone that updated their PC and stopped accessing the site is no longer able to access it via IE8. When they try Firefox/Chrome there are no problems.
What has really been making life difficult to us is:
-this doesn?t happen to all users, only to some. Most are using updated IE8 with no problems; however, due to the size of our user base, those ?some? are in fact a couple of thousand…
-I have personally installed (from scratch) over 20 PCs in this time period, with full updates. None had any problem accessing.
-We have been totally unable to find any pattern (aside from IE8+update-from-hell) in the blocked users: some have Vista, others XP, some have google/yahoo bars, some none, some have full anti-virus/security blockers, others none, add-ons on/off…
I even have a case with 2 users, sharing the same PC: one can access fine, when the other reboots and enters the PC with his login (and associated settings, desktop etc) he can?t access the site…
I?ve tried all the classic solutions: ?delete all cookies/temp files?, resetting IE settings to default, etc. Even navigating ?by hand? to the usual C:\Documents and Settings\user folder and deleting all the temp files there…
After 3 months of trying anything short of ?format C:? I?m pretty much close to giving up. I?ve posted this in several forums and newsgroups but no luck. I?ve been telling these users to switch to Firefox/Chrome and they are happy.
Problem is, the general level of computer skills of our users is quite low. Also, many access the site from their own work PCs. This all means that, quite often, they are stuck with IE8 either because they are not allowed to install other software or are simply too afraid to do it…
I?ve found, here and there on the net, references to similar IE problems when accessing sites with logins, but found nothing specific or useful. If anyone has any ideas or had similar problems please let me know.