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HCL Commerce is a high-availability, highly scalable and customizable e-commerce platform. Able to support hundreds of thousands of transactions per day, HCL Commerce allows you to do business with consumers (B2C) or directly with businesses (B2B). HCL Commerce uses cloud friendly technology to make deployment and operation both easy and efficient. It provides easy-to-use tools for business users to centrally manage a cross-channel strategy. Business users can create and manage precision marketing campaigns, promotions, catalog, and merchandising across all sales channels. Business users can also use AI enabled content management capabilities.
Troubleshooting
Topics in the Troubleshooting section highlight common issues that are encountered with HCL Commerce, and how they can be addressed or mitigated.
Installation issues
Installing and uninstalling HCL Commerce encompass a wide range of procedures. If you encounter problems, refer to the following resources for assistance.
Oracle JDBC driver error (java.lang.NullPointerException)
When using an Oracle database, and running the updatedb utility from the Utility server Docker container with the isStaging parameter specified, you can experience a NullPointerException error.

Documentation
HCL Commerce is a high-availability, highly scalable and customizable e-commerce platform. Able to support hundreds of thousands of transactions per day, HCL Commerce allows you to do business with consumers (B2C) or directly with businesses (B2B). HCL Commerce uses cloud friendly technology to make deployment and operation both easy and efficient. It provides easy-to-use tools for business users to centrally manage a cross-channel strategy. Business users can create and manage precision marketing campaigns, promotions, catalog, and merchandising across all sales channels. Business users can also use AI enabled content management capabilities.
- Getting started
  HCL Commerce has different advantages for business users, administrators and developers. HCL Commerce targets each of these roles with a tailored set of offerings so that each of your users can get maximum benefit.
- Installing and deploying
  Learn how to install and deploy HCL Commerce development environments and HCL Commerce production environments.
- Migrating
  Before you migrate to HCL Commerce Version 9, review this information to help plan and execute your migration.
- Operating
  Topics in the Operating category highlight tasks that are typically performed by business users, customer support representatives, to complete their day-to-day tasks in the operation of the HCL Commerce site.
- Integrating
  Topics in the Integrating category highlight the tasks that are commonly performed for using HCL Commerce in combination with other products.
- Administering
  Topics in the Administering category highlight tasks that are typically performed by the Site Administrator, to support daily operations of the HCL Commerce site.
- Customizing
  The topics in the Customizing section describe tasks performed by an application developer to customize HCL Commerce.
- Tutorials
  HCL Commerce provides many tutorials to help you customize and understand your HCL Commerce instance and stores.
- Samples
  Topics in the Samples category highlight the various samples that are provided with HCL Commerce.
- Compliance
  The following section describes how you can leverage HCL Commerce features and functionality to help your site be compliant with different privacy and security standards.
- Securing
  These topics describe the security features of HCL Commerce and how to configure these features.
- Performance
  Topics in the Performance section describe the means by which to plan, implement, test, and re-visit the optimization of HCL Commerce site performance.
- Troubleshooting
  Topics in the Troubleshooting section highlight common issues that are encountered with HCL Commerce, and how they can be addressed or mitigated.
  - Contacting HCL Customer Support
    HCL Customer Support provides assistance with product defects. Contact HCL if you require assistance with an HCL Commerce problem.
  - MustGather requirements for HCL Support
    Use the following topics to gather the required information that you need to troubleshoot issues that you are facing with HCL Commerce with HCL Support.
  - Installation issues
    Installing and uninstalling HCL Commerce encompass a wide range of procedures. If you encounter problems, refer to the following resources for assistance.
    - Failed to dataload schema/data/xml/9.0.0/wcs.9.0.0.2.bootstrap.xml
      You might notice the following error when you run the updatedb utility after upgrading to HCL Commerce Version 9.0.0.2.
    - Project compilation errors
      After upgrading your version of HCL Commerce Developer, you can encounter compilation errors for projects within Rational Application Developer.
    - DB2 SQL Error: SQLCODE=-554, SQLSTATE=42502 when you try to load database schema
      When you are preparing a database for HCL Commerce Version 9, you need to run the initdb_db2_sample utility. During execution, you might encounter a message similar to the following error.
    - Oracle JDBC driver error (java.lang.NullPointerException)
      When using an Oracle database, and running the updatedb utility from the Utility server Docker container with the isStaging parameter specified, you can experience a NullPointerException error.
    - Transaction server stop working after installation
      If you install HCL Commerce Developer Version V9.0.0.2 or later on HCL Commerce Developer V9.0.0.0 or 9.0.0.1, your transaction server might not work properly and you might find Db2 connection errors in the log file.
    - EJB errors after updating to HCL Commerce Developer Version 9.0.0.1 or 9.0.0.2
      After you install the HCL Commerce Developer Version 9.0.0.1 or 9.0.0.2 Update Package, your store does not work and you notice EJB errors in the log.
    - InvalidOperation: (replace:String)
      When you are preparing a database for HCL Commerce Version 9, you need to run the initdb_db2_sample utility. During execution, you might encounter an InvalidOperation: (replace:String) error.
    - Cannot access localhost service after installation
      After you install HCL Commerce Developer and start the servers, you try to access the storefront or search services but you notice that localhost cannot connect or localhost refused.
    - Server errors in in SystemOut.log after installation
      After you install HCL Commerce Developer, run setdbtype, and start the servers, you might notice errors in the SystemOut.log.
    - Missing db2jcc4.jar library when starting HCL Commerce Developer
      When installing and starting HCL Commerce Developer for the first time, you can encounter a missing database Java archive file (.jar).
    - Compilation errors occur when you run the HCL Commerce Build tool
      When using the HCL Commerce Build tool, you can encounter Java compilation errors caused by missing Java classes.
    - Lost connection to Elasticsearch in single-machine Docker configuration
      If your Docker containers are running on a single computer that uses Intel System Studio, you can experience eventual loss of your connection to Elasticsearch. To avoid this, enable the "Expose daemon without TLS" option.
  - Integration issues
    Integrating HCL Commerce encompass a wide range of procedures. If you encounter problems, refer to the following resources for assistance.
  - General issues
    Review the following information when you encounter any general problems with HCL Commerce.
  - Migration issues
    Migrating HCL Commerce involves a wide range of steps across your different environments. If you encounter problems, refer to the following resources for assistance.
  - Logging issues
    If you encounter problems while you use HCL Commerce logging, refer to the following troubleshooting information to help determine the problem and find possible solutions.
  - Access control issues
    Access control problems are often indicated by generic application errors with error message keys such as _ERR_USER_AUTHORITY. The first step in problem determination is to enable tracing for the access control component.
  - Aurora starter store
    If you encounter problems when you use the Aurora starter store, refer to the troubleshooting information to help determine the problem and find possible solutions.
  - Member group issues
- Reference
  Topics in the Reference section contain all of the HCL Commerce reference documentation.

Troubleshooting: Oracle JDBC driver error (java.lang.NullPointerException)

When using an Oracle database, and running the updatedb utility from the Utility server Docker container with the isStaging parameter specified, you can experience a NullPointerException error.

Problem

For Oracle database, the updatedb utility uses the legacy JDBC driver oracle.jdbc.driver.OracleDriver by default. This version of the driver is not compatible with the utility, which is designed to work with the new driver oracle.jdbc.OracleDriver. As a result, a NullPointerException error is thrown. This issue is experienced on an authoring Oracle database only.

The error displayed is similar to the following:

[stagingck] action=insert, tablename=WCS_Fixpack, serverOrToolkit=server, stagingServer=true, stagingDbChecked=false, logLevel=5
BUILD FAILED
/opt/WebSphere/CommerceServer90/components/common/xml/fixpack.xml:44: The following error occurred while executing this line:
/opt/WebSphere/CommerceServer90/components/common/xml/fixpack.xml:138: java.lang.NullPointerException
Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException
at com.ibm.commerce.config.ant.tasks.BasicAntDbTask.execute(BasicAntDbTask.java:121)
at com.ibm.commerce.config.ant.tasks.CheckStagingDbTask.execute(CheckStagingDbTask.java:157)
at org.apache.tools.ant.UnknownElement.execute(UnknownElement.java:275)
at org.apache.tools.ant.Task.perform(Task.java:364)

Solution

To resolve the issue, specify the correct JDBC driver, oracle.jdbc.OracleDriver, using the jdbcDriver parameter.

For example:

./updatedb.sh -dbType dbType -dbName dbName -dbUserName dbUserName -dbUserPassword dbUserPassword -dbHostname dbHostname -dbServerPort dbServerPort -dbaName dbaName -dbaPassword dbaPassword -jdbcURL jdbcURL -jdbcDriver oracle.jdbc.OracleDriver -isStaging isStaging

The error will not occur.