Re: Getting DB error = 20017 - Unexpected EOF from the server

[email protected] wrote on 03/18/2009 04:38:47 PM:
> > 
> > Can you reproduce the problem by simply logging in with tsql and 
> > letting it sit overnight or do you have to have your whole 
> > application/messaging setup running?
> 
> I'm trying this now and should know tomorrow.

It's been 24 hours and the answer to this question is yes.  I initiated a 
connection yesterday morning and let it sit.  This morning I attempted 
another sp_who command and it failed.

This led us to a message in a server log that confirmed what a lot of us 
thought right away.   They were killing the processes.  I suspect that the 
current owners of the system do not even know they are doing it.  Ugh!

We found the process that was doing the killing and there were multiple 
scenarios of why a process would be killed.  The one that got the TSQL 
process was a check in the sysprocesses table for any hostprocess name 
that was not 8 characters in length.  If such a process was up for more 
than 24 hours, it was killed.  It appears that the processes from the 
Sybase client on the VAX using the SRI INET driver seems to always produce 
8 character hostprocess names.  The connection from TSQL is less than 8 
characters, thus it was killed after 24 hours.

I want to thank all that helped find this issue and apologize for 
something that, in retrospect, should have been correctable internally.  I 
did find out that not only is the price for FreeTDS right, the support is 
superb.

-Jeff