[Leif Maxfield]

We seem to have narrowed down the scenario in which this occurs but we
don't have a solution for it -- it seems to be a bug in Office '07. If
the behavior is by design I can't really grasp the rationale. The problem
is this:

For a password-protected document, you are given the option of entering a
password to open the file with write permissions or opening a Read Only
copy of the file. In Office '03, opening a Read Only copy of a password-
protected document stored on a network share would NOT result in a lock
being placed on the file. Another user could still open that file with
write permission and edit it although others were viewing it in Read Only
mode.

In Office '07, when opening a password-protected document stored on
network share as Read Only, a lock IS being placed on the file. When
another user attempts to open the file, perhaps with the intention of
writing to it, they are not presented with a password / Read Only prompt
-- they get the "%file% is locked for editing by 'another user'", and the
only option is to open another Read Only copy (or save a local copy/wait
for the user to unlock the file).

A lock does not appear to be placed on password-protected documents
stored on the local disk and opened as Read Only. I tested by placing a
file in a shared directory local to one machine, opening the file as Read
Only with Office '07, and then on a separate machine opening the same
file via the share. I received a password prompt (as I would expect)
rather than a "locked for editing" message.

As I said -- we do not have this issue with Office '03, only with Office
'07. Has anyone else seen this problem?