FIX: Replication Agents May Fail With Arithmetic Overflow Errors Due to Large Latencies (260342)

CAUSE

When the delivery latencies of replication agents are high, the stored procedures that compute average delivery latency report the following error message:

Error 8115 Sev 16 Arithmetic overflow error converting %ls to data type %ls.

WORKAROUND

Locate the history table in the distribution database that corresponds with the type of agent that is failing. The logreader agent uses the mslogreader_history system table and the distribution agent uses the msdistribution_history system table. Set the delivery_latency value found in the history table to zero for the row with the latest "time" value in the time column for a given agent_id. For example:

update MSdistribution_history set delivery_latency=0 where agent_id=1 and time =(select max(time) from MSdistribution_history where agent_id=1)

The agent_id should be appropriately selected from distribution..msdistribution_agents.

The preceding workaround temporarily resolves the problem by allowing the agent to run but does not prevent the problem from happening again.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in SQL Server 7.0. This problem has been corrected in U.S. Service Pack 3 for Microsoft SQL Server 7.0. For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

274799 INF: How to Obtain Service Pack 3 for Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 and Microsoft Data Engine (MSDE) 1.0