SharePoint PDF document URL contains additional parameter

Question

Hi,

Does anyone know why O365 SharePoint adds extra parameters to the URL of a PDF document.

Example: https://contoso.sharepoint.com/sites/finance/Documents/EmptyPDF.pdf**?d=wcb30ac8bbc004b92a07748397e03fde5**

In case of an office document, no parameters are added to the URL.

Exmaple: 

https://contoso.sharepoint.com/sites/finance/Documents/EmptyExcel.xlsx

https://contoso.sharepoint.com/sites/finance/Documents/EmptyDoc.docx

Kr,

Aziz

Answer 1

Hi Aziz,

This has been updated in SharePoint Online, where the durable links are added to provide a resource Id.

The parameters at the end of the file URL in SharePoint library is the GUID of the document which is used to identify the file. The resource Id assigned to individual documents is stored in the content database related to the source document. When using Durable Links (d), when a user selects a link to a specific document, SharePoint Server looks up the file by the resource Id and opens it in Office Online Server Preview. 

Thanks,

Neha

Answer 2

Hi Neha, 

Thnx for the reply.

Based on your reply I found a blog about this: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/wbaer/2015/09/22/durable-links-in-sharepoint-server-2016-it-preview/

I was wondering why office documents in my case do not have a resource id. 

Kr,

Aziz

Answer 3

Hi Aziz,

The GUID or the resource id should be available for all Office documents uploaded to SharePoint Online. You can confirm by following the steps below:

1. Navigate to your SharePoint site, open document library.
2. Click on the ellipses (…) beside the document name, as shown in the following screenshot.

             

You will see the d=doc id available. However, when the document is opened in Word Online, the URL will be changed.

Let us know if you have any doubt. You can also send us a related screenshot if you cannot see the same behavior from your side.

Thanks,

Neha

Answer 4

Hi Neha,

Please see below a screenshot of a Word document preview in SharePoint. The URL doesn't contain any parameter.

Answer 5

Hi Aziz,

To narrow this down, can you please provide us with the following information?

1. Please check the documents in other library or perhaps in other SharePoint site just to confirm if this behavior is with a particular document or with other docs as well.
2. Can you create a new site to check if this is happening with new sites or just with the existing one?
3. Please check with other users, if possible.

Thanks,

Neha