Help: SQL Server

Sharing my knowlege about SQL Server Troubleshooting Skills

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Archive for March, 2014

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Troubleshooting : Msg 3201 – Cannot open backup device .. Operating system error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.)

Posted by blakhani on March 13, 2014


Data recovery is a time consuming and expensive process. Taking regular backups can save a lot of time as well as make sure that the data can be restored in the case of disaster. There could be many situation where backup of the database taken in SQL Server might fail with 3201 error. The text of error id as below (you can use sys.messages catalog view to get it)

Cannot open backup device ‘%ls’. Operating system error %ls.

Same message is applicable for restore as well, it’s all about unable to open device. If we notice %ls is placeholder which would be inserted when message is raised. Some sample errors are as below.

Message # 1

Msg 3201, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Cannot open backup device ‘E:\Backup\SQLServerHelp.bak’. Operating system error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.).

Cause: Backup folder not created on E Drive.

Message # 2

Msg 3201, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Cannot open backup device ‘C:\SQLServerHelp.bak’. Operating system error 5(Access is denied.).

Cause: SQL Server Service account is not having permission on root of C Drive.

Message # 3

Msg 3201, Level 16, State 2, Line 1
Cannot open backup device ‘\\NetworkShare\Backup\SQLServerHelp.BAK’. Operating system error 53(error not found).

This one is interesting because it doesn’t tell the exact message for OS error 53. Sometime this could happen with any other OS error as well. Refer my earlier post here where I showed how to get text for an operating system error number. 53 = The network path was not found.

Cause: Network Path: \\NetworkShare\Backup was incorrect.

OK. Let me stop here.. I didn’t plan to discuss all the possible errors but this blog is to present one interesting scenario which helped me uncovering an operating system concept.

Let’s create a database using below script.

Create Database [SQL Server Help ]

Once database is created I have created maintenance plan to take full backup of the database.

image

When I executed above maintenance plan, it failed with error:

image

TITLE: Execute Maintenance Plan

——————————

Execution failed. See the maintenance plan and SQL Server Agent job history logs for details.

——————————

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

Job ‘SQLServerHelp.Subplan_1’ failed. (SqlManagerUI)

——————————

BUTTONS:

OK

——————————

If we look at the folder, the folder got created but backup failed. Looked into ERRORLOG and found below

2014-03-13 06:20:31.66 spid65      Error: 18204, Severity: 16, State: 1.

2014-03-13 06:20:31.66 spid65      BackupDiskFile::CreateMedia: Backup device ‘E:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL11.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Backup\SQL Server Help \SQL Server Help _backup_2014_03_13_062031_6415729.bak’ failed to create. Operating system error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.).

2014-03-13 06:20:31.66 Backup      Error: 3041, Severity: 16, State: 1.

2014-03-13 06:20:31.66 Backup      BACKUP failed to complete the command BACKUP DATABASE SQL Server Help . Check the backup application log for detailed messages.

when I looked at folder structure, I found that there is a folder “SQL Server Help” got created under “E:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL11.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Backup” but still backup was failing. I ran profiler to see the command being fired.

BACKUP DATABASE [SQL Server Help ] 
TO  DISK = N'E:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL11.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Backup\SQL Server Help \SQL Server Help _backup_2014_03_13_062920_6305771.bak' 
WITH NOFORMAT, NOINIT,  NAME = N'SQL Server Help _backup_2014_03_13_062920_6305771', 
SKIP, REWIND, NOUNLOAD,  STATS = 10

 

When I executed the command, it failed with below error.

Msg 3201, Level 16, State 1, Line 1

Cannot open backup device ‘E:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL11.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Backup\SQL Server Help \SQL Server Help _backup_2014_03_13_062920_6305771.bak’. Operating system error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.).

Msg 3013, Level 16, State 1, Line 1

BACKUP DATABASE is terminating abnormally.


Again, something wrong with the path where I am taking backup. Do you see any problem in above message. Look closer.. there is a space at the end in the folder name where backup is attempted. “SQL Server Help “. If you try to create a folder with the whitespace at the end, operating system would trim the space at the end. This is documented here

The root cause of my problem was name of the database where I have added an space at the end intentionally. Go back and have a look at create database statement which I have used. I also participated in this discussion where same problem was posted long back.

Hope you have learned something new!

  • Cheers,
  • Balmukund Lakhani
  • Twitter @blakhani
  • Author: SQL Server 2012 AlwaysOn – Paperback, Kindle
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    Posted in Error, SQL Server | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments »

    SSMS Tip: Merging ERRORLOGs from different machines using Log File Viewer

    Posted by blakhani on March 6, 2014


    For those who don’t know what/where is SQL Server ERRORLOG, please read this

    Log File Viewer is an interesting feature of Management Studio and I have been ignoring it (you too??). This tool as saved a lot of time for me so thought of sharing some cool features of this tool. This can load various logs including system event log, application event log, DB Mail Log and SQL Agent log.

    As a part of my regular work, I need to look at SQL Server ERRORLOG to look for various information about environment like SQL version and Edition, Processors and memory etc. If you want to know where ERRORLOG is located, then read here.

    While working on a case on AlwaysOn Availability Group, customer provided us errorlog from two machines. To complete my analysis, I have to merge the file from both servers so that I can look at series of event happening across the server. Since customer was not having access to physical machine, he used management studio to “export” the errorlog.

    Here are the steps to export the log using “Log File Viewer”

    image

    Once the viewer is opened, it opens current ERRORLOG file from the server. If we want to see more we can select checkbox on the left hand tree as highlighted below.

    image

    Export button can be used to Save the content on local machine. This is useful when we don’t have access to physical server to get file.

    To demonstrate “merge”, I have exported current ERRORLOG from three servers and saved them as ERRORLOG_SQLPAPA, ERRORLOG_SRV1 and ERRORLOG_SRV2. I have kept all files in same machine and launched SSMS there. First, we need  to load the log as shown below.

    image

    One all are loaded, we can see them on left hand tree. Select the checkbox if it has to be loaded on right side grid.

    image

    I have selected all three files. Now, in the grid there is one interesting column, Log Source which shows the file which is loaded. I have dragged the column header and moved to visible location.

    image

    If we sort by date column, we can easily see the series of message in errorlog based of time. Since we have “Log Source” column, it possible to find server name as well. That’s why I have given File Name which is meaningful. In above screenshot I can see that top 3 messages are from different servers and I know the time as well.

    You can be more creative and use “Filter” to load only specific data which you are interested.

    Hope you liked this cool feature. Please provide feedback via comments.

  • Cheers,
  • Balmukund Lakhani
  • Twitter @blakhani
  • Author: SQL Server 2012 AlwaysOn – Paperback, Kindle

    • Posted in SQL Server Management Studio, SSMS | Tagged: , , , | 1 Comment »

    Troubleshooting: Cannot execute as the database principal and Property Owner is not available for Database

    Posted by blakhani on March 4, 2014


    No one likes errors in the world. As a part of my work with Microsoft SQL Support Services, I get to see various errors, find cause and provide solution to get rid of them. Today someone reported below error to me.

    Cannot execute as the database principal because the principal "dbo" does not exist, this type of principal cannot be impersonated, or you do not have permission.

    This error message was caused because SQL Server was not able to find context information for the security logon we were attempting to impersonate. In this case it was “dbo”. Going with common sense, I went ahead to check the owner of the database, which is generally visible in database > right click > properties. As soon as I attempted it, I was welcomed with next error message.

    image

    TITLE: Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio
    ——————————
    Cannot show requested dialog.
    ——————————
    ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
    Cannot show requested dialog. (SqlMgmt)
    ——————————
    Property Owner is not available for Database ‘[SQLServerHelp]’. This property may not exist for this object, or may not be retrievable due to insufficient access rights.  (Microsoft.SqlServer.Smo)
    For help, click: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink?ProdName=Microsoft+SQL+Server&ProdVer=10.50.1746.0+((KJ_RTM_QFE-CU).101005-1216+)&EvtSrc=Microsoft.SqlServer.Management.Smo.ExceptionTemplates.PropertyCannotBeRetrievedExceptionText&EvtID=Owner&LinkId=20476
    ——————————
    BUTTONS:
    OK
    —————————— 
     

    Okay. This is an interesting message. Notice the exception event source is “PropertyCannotBeRetrievedExceptionText” and exception event id “Owner”. The message means that on SMO, the value of “owner” property is not available. This means something is not right with owner of the database?

    Next step was to find out who the current owner (without management studio). There are multiple ways to do it.

    • sp_helpdb

    image

    • sp_helpdb ‘DatabaseName’

    image

    • T-SQL which is used by sp_helpdb 
    select name, isnull(suser_sname(sid),'~~UNKNOWN~~'), 
convert(nvarchar(11), crdate),
dbid, cmptlevel from master.dbo.sysdatabases

     

    image

    As we can see above, “~~UNKNOWN~~” is not something which is not expected and that’s the reason SSMS was showing exception to get owner property.

    How to fix it?

    Of course, change the owner of the database so that value of SID column holds valid SID. Since we are not able to use UI, we have to use sp_changedbowner (change db owner with no spaces). This has be to run in the context of the database which has problem, as shown below. I have given sa as an example for my database.

    image

    Root Cause/Repro of the issue

    If a database is owned by a login, we would not be able to drop the login. The possible situation which I can think of are:

    • Database owned by windows login which was part of any Windows Group. And now, windows account was deleted from active directory. 
    • Database was restored and domain controller was not available to resolve the SID to a validate login.

    In my repro, I was able to get into same situation by step 1.

    Important: I was NOT able to reproduce the “property owner” error in SQL Server 2014 Management Studio. It doesn’t throw exception of owner property and it can be blank in the UI.

    image

    This also means that owner can be changed via management studio by going to Properties  > Files tab.

    image

    Hope you have learned something new.

  • Cheers,
  • Balmukund Lakhani
  • Twitter @blakhani
  • Author: SQL Server 2012 AlwaysOn – Paperback, Kindle

    • Posted in Error, SQL Server, SSMS | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

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