Hello all, My organization has recently discovered an issue with .aspx files hosted on SharePoint. We've been using them to launch Storyline and Rise files so they act like web pages (like this). However, we just recently found that after reuploading the file or folder to SharePoint, SharePoint no longer opens the page. If you navigate to the .aspx file, it force-downloads the file. If you use the direct URL, you get a File Not Found error.We suspect this is a SharePoint issue that has to do with the upload process. My IT department has asked me to check here to see if anyone else has experienced this problem, and if so, what the root cause was (e.g., Microsoft update, policy change, etc.)? We're looking at SharePoint because: It happens to multiple people in multiple offices (not a computer issue). It happens with Chrome and Edge. Modifying the URL to add ?web=1 has no effect. Clearing cache and cookies has no effect (not a browser issue). I tested the "old" file to confirm it worked, then downloaded the .zip package from SP. When I reuploaded the exact same package back to SP, the file now force-downloads/is not found (so it's not the files or the Storyline version). I copied a file that's still working and uploaded the copy. The original opens as a web page, the copy doesn't (again, not the files). Thanks in advance for your feedback!

HI all, We've confirmed the issue is related to what's described in the links above. Our IT group was able to implement a temporary solution that lasts for 1 day, so right now we need to ask in advance for a script to be run when we want to make an update. If you need to talk to your IT team about this, ask about delaying enforcement of the "Deny Add and Customize Pages" setting. It sounds like there are SharePoint changes coming in November of '24 that will block this workaround and require a shift to SharePoint Framework (SPFx) or an alternate solution. So now would be a great time to start engaging your SharePoint admin or IT team for planning purposes.

Thanks for the feedback, We're currently looking at a custom script setting as the possible cause of the problem: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/allow-or-prevent-custom-script#to-allow-custom-script-on-other-sharepoint-sites. We're working to see if changing the site permissions to custom script allowed to see if that solves the problem. Implementation is still in progress but this might be worth investigating.

maybe this has to do with the problem https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/allow-or-prevent-custom-script#to-allow-custom-script-on-onedrive-or-user-created-sites

We have multiple SharePoint Online sites and some don't have the custom scripts permission enabled due to the IT and security restrictions, hence the asp files will force download instead of open in the browser on those sites. The workaround for us is to get a site owner to upload the asp file to the SharePoint site that has the custom scripts enabled, then use the "move to" or "copy to" SharePoint feature to transfer the files to the other SharePoint sites. For some reason the permission retains, and the asp files would open in browser on all sites regardless the custom scripts permissions. Not sure if this method will continue work as the future SharePoint updates may block it, but at least it works for us now.

In the past, when we ran into this problem in SharePoint Online, it was always fixed by "Enabling Script" in that site (Set-PnPSite -NoScriptSite $false) But today, we ran into this problem even on sites where that setting was turned on. The "solution" that worked was a strange behavior: When the file was "dragged and dropped" into the library, it did not work. When the same file was "uploaded" into the library, it worked. When I looked deeper into why this was happening: When the file was dragged and dropped, the above "No Execute" property on the file was set to 1 and it did not work.. When the file was uploaded using the upload button, this property was set to 0 and it worked. However, since this is a read-only built-in hidden property, it was not possible to update it through a script. I believe, this started happening after the recent updates to SharePoint Online Admin portal to control the "Enable Script" behavior through UI (SharePoint Admin Center --> Active Sites --> Change View to 'Custom Script allowed Sites' --> Settings --> Custom Scripts) and the auto-switching they implemented to get it back to Blocked within 24 hours. Unfortunately the above solution to upload instead of Drag-Drop is not reliable and if anyone can shed any help or pointers to work around this, it will be a great help. Thanks!

.ASPX Files Now Download Instead of Launching from SharePoint

FancyHippo
Community Member
3 months ago
If anyone decides to move away from SharePoint, please share what platform you land on.
TichelleBerg-d3
Community Member
2 months ago
I'm curious if anyone has had the opportunity to set up SharePoint Framework (SPFx) and do testing to see if eLearning content runs correctly with it? I've looked at some of the "how to" content out there for SPFx, and to be honest, I'm not sure that's a great solution for us. Our trainers are not developers, and there's a lot of geeky steps that seem to have to happen to execute our content on SharePoint Online using SPFx.

I'm also exploring housing our content on a web server and just use SharePoint Online for the user interface with buttons to everything. That's what we do with SharePoint Online right now, except, of course, in the moment, all of our HTML5 files are in document libraries on SharePoint. We would just have to update all the links on our buttons, and transitioning to a web server would be seamless for our end users.
JohnCooper-be3c
Community Member
2 months ago
To be fair to Microsoft, I suspect this change is to do with tightening up security. I'm a HUGE SharePoint fan and have been from the start BUT, if you think about it... allowing custom scripts to run outside the SharePoint framework is an incredibly dangerous thing to do! It can introduce significant security vulnerabilities that could be exploited to gain unauthorized access to data or execute malicious code.

SharePoint was never designed as an LMS and it really isn't its purpose. We initially flirted with LMS365 in order to provide an LMS that could use the same user database as SharePoint. Which, after all, is a major reason for wanting to include learning and development material on SharePoint - but it was expensive. I don't know if anyone else is using LMS365 now (I think it may have been re-titled)???
- TichelleBerg-d3
  Community Member
  2 months ago
  Absolutely, John, Microsoft's change is to tighten up security. I, too, love SharePoint, and have for years, and I'm always a fan of tighter security.
  
  We have no need for an LMS for most of our content. We use our organization's LMS for compliance-related training that requires tracking. But the bulk of our training is more just-in-time support for staff, and it's intended to be accessed quickly. It's a support resource, and we know that if staff have to log on to an LMS to access support content, they won't do it. Hence the SharePoint :)
IraBrown-57cd02
Community Member
2 months ago
One thing we discovered during our search for a fix is that the coding in the Articulate web files is massively out of date according to one of our Dev folks that have helped us thus far. The coding references SWF code which he found odd.

Has anyone been able to speak with anyone with Articulate to get any assistance? I'm surprised a staff member hasn't seen this thread yet.
- TichelleBerg-d3
  Community Member
  2 months ago
  I would expect the SWF code if you're using an older template that still uses the HTML5/Flash hybrid of publishing. I've tried to catch all of those that my team was using and rebuild or retire those projects. But if it's a newer project, that would be disappointing...
FancyHippo
Community Member
16 days ago
Has anyone noticed an issue with your embedded video files now being downloaded as an .html file instead of showing up properly within a slide?
- TichelleBerg-d3
  Community Member
  16 days ago
  FancyHippothat hasn't happened for me yet. I just republished one and did a test upload to SharePoint Online and it had no problem playing the videos correctly. It did not download the video files.
HayleyNewbery
Community Member
7 days ago
Hi All, I'm now facing this same issue that everyone here has been describing when publishing to sharepoint using a .aspx file. After investigating with IT and trying the solutions that many of you recommended (thank you!), nothing is working. I have a .aspx file from last year that is publishing just fine, it is the one from 2024 that is not working. When looking at this we realized it doesn't appear to be a Sharepoint issue, we can publish .aspx files just fine. Instead, we think it has to do with the export and something having changed in storyline that is impacting that. Has anyone been able to talk to someone from Articulate support about this issue? If not, does anyone know how to do that?
- KellyAuner
  Staff
  4 days ago
  Hi HayleyNewbery,
  
  Thanks for reaching out and I'm sorry to hear you're running into this issue!
  
  Is this happening with one specific course or multiple courses from 2024? If you'd like to share your file with one of our Support Engineers, you can connect with them in a support case. They'll be happy to take a closer look to resolve your issue or point you in the right direction. We'll delete any files from our systems once troubleshooting is complete.