Understanding the InfoPath SP1 URN Form Conflict Dialog

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Background on URNs

InfoPath SP1 included changes to the mail deployment model to allow for easier ways to distribute form templates to a group. One of the tools for making this deployment model work is the URN (Uniform Resource Name). These URNs are generated automatically by InfoPath and should be unique for each new form template you build.

Note: It’s possible to get a URN that’s identical to an existing one, but not very likely. This will be explained more later on.

To see the URN for your form template, you can select ‘File | Properties’ when in the Designer. The URN is listed there as the ‘Form ID’. It is called a Form ID because it is used in the deployment model to identify a form template that may be opened from different locations. The URN is generated by combining three sections separated by semicolons based in part on the form template’s properties. Here’s a sample URN:

urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:infopath:blogsample:-myXSD-2004-05-19T20-48-18

It consists of three parts:

  • Prefix: [urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:infopath]
  • Form Name (the filename by default): [blogsample]
  • The Namespace or Namespace Timestamp: [-myXSD-2004-05-19T20-48-18]

Note: The Namespace Timestamp is used whenever a user starts out building the schema within InfoPath. If a form template is built from an XML or XSD file which has its own Namespace, then that Namespace will be used.

The Conflict Dialog

Picture of the URN conflict dialog

This dialog will appear any time that you open a form template on your machine that has a URN that matches an existing URN that you’ve previously opened and cached, but references a different Access Path (or publish location, URL). As you can see in the example above, I have a file called ‘blogsample.xsn’ that I’ve opened from My Documents, but the conflict dialog is saying that I’ve previously opened a file with the same URN from my Desktop. I got myself into this situation by publishing the same form template to two separate locations with the same filename and then opening each of them. Because the Form Name and Namespace timestamp are identical for both XSNs, so is the URN.

There are two options at this point. I can either open the newer template (Version 1.0.0.2) by clicking ‘Replace Form on Your Computer’ or the older one (Version 1.0.0.1) by clicking ‘Keep Form on Your Computer’. It is important to note that this dialog does not affect the original copies of these files in any way. It will only update your local cache and it will update the file that is shown with this Form Name in your Fill Out a Form dialog.