Microsoft has fixed a known issue affecting Windows apps using ODBC database connections after installing the November 2022 Patch Tuesday updates.
This issue impacts both client and server Windows platforms, from Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 SP2 up to the latest released Windows 11 and Windows Server 2022.
Microsoft said today that this month’s Patch Tuesday updates address “a known issue that affects apps that use Microsoft Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) SQL Server Driver (sqlsrv32.dll) to connect to databases.”
“The connection might fail. You might also receive an error in the app, or you might receive an error from the SQL Server.”
As Redmond revealed in December, impacted apps might fail to connect to databases with the help of Microsoft’s ODBC SQL Server driver (sqlsrv32.dll) after installing the November Patch Tuesday updates.
To check if apps that use ODBC connections fail to fetch data, you can launch them and then run the “tasklist /m sqlsrv32.dll” command from a Command Prompt window (without the quotes).
Temporary mitigation also available
Customers affected by this known issue who can’t immediately install today’s cumulative updates can use two methods to mitigate its impact and revive the broken apps:
- If your app is already using or able to use Data Source Name (DSN) to select ODBC connections, install Microsoft ODBC Driver 17 for SQL Server and select it for use with your app using DSN
- If your app is unable to use DSN, the app will need to be modified to allow for DSN or to use a newer ODBC driver than Microsoft ODBC SQL Server Driver (sqlsrv32.dll).
Microsoft added today that “if you have implemented the above workaround, it is recommended to continue using the configuration in the workaround.”
Other issues triggered by November’s Patch Tuesday updates were also addressed during the last two months, including domain controller sign-in failures and other authentication problems and freezes and restarts on some domain controllers caused by an LSASS memory leak issue.
Today, Redmond also fixed an issue triggering blue screen crashes with 0xc000021a errors on Windows 10 systems after installing the KB5021233 update released during the December Patch Tuesday.