The ERP Hacker

“DefaultType ‘21′ must be defined to specify linkage.”

May 18th, 2010

There’s nothing I hate worse than a poorly-worded error message.  Case in point: The one in the title.

It came up when I was trying to configure Syteline.  Syteline’s help file was no help, neither was Google or Bing.  What is a “DefaultType”? What is the significance of the value “21″?  How do you define it?  What linkage are they talking about?

OK, I was able to figure out that last one.  The error came up when I was trying to link the Objects database with a configuration.  It gave me this cryptic error whenever I tried.

I tried creating a new Objects database, but got the same result.  I tried linking to a known good Objects database on another server.  No luck.

Actually, yes luck.  This gave me an important clue: The problem was not with the Objects database.  I was with one of the others, probably the applications database.

So, I tried it again, this time while tracing the SQL activity.  Sure enough, the configuration app was looking for the value “21″ in a table called “DefaultTypes”.

I looked for DefaultTypes in the apps database, and there it was.  I was able to copy over the record from a working server to the test server I was trying to set up, and hey presto! I was back in business.

At least, I am back in Normal Syteline Hell rather than Cryptic Syteline Hell as I was a few minutes ago.  One step at a time.

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