Stopping FrontPage calls

[smallcompany]

Among others, I have this line in .htaccess:

RewriteRule ^(MSOffice/cltreq\.asp¦/_vti_bin/owssvr\.dll)$ - [F,L] (pipe is regular one in a real code)

It is intended to stop FrontPage calls that generate 404s.

Still, I see _vti_bin/owssvr.dll going through. I wonder if it’s about syntax or something else.

Thank you.

[Samizdata]

I use these conditions (amongst others):

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/(MSOffice¦_vti) [NC,OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} FrontPage [NC,OR]

I almost certainly learned them from this forum.

[smallcompany]

Thanks.

Interestingly, although I described them as “FrontPage”, user agents making requests for those two files never have FrontPage inside their names. They are rather like ordinary UAs.

[jdMorgan]

1) Remove the leading slash from the "/_vti_bin/owssvr\.dll" pattern.
2) [L] used with [F] is redundant. Instead of [F,L], you can just use [F] without changing the result.

These "owssvr" requests are the result of a user having the "discussion bar" turned on in MSWord or other office apps. The discussion bar is used for on-line collaboration, but I suspect that in many cases, it has simply been turned on by accident.

Jim