Cannot move view between catalogs: from=

Error message

Cannot move view between catalogs: from=${oldCatalog.name} and to=${newIdent.catalog().name()}

What it means

ExtendedDataSourceV2Strategy throws this AnalysisException when ALTER VIEW ... RENAME TO resolves to a different catalog than the one holding the original view. Iceberg's ViewCatalog supports renaming views only within the same catalog; cross-catalog moves are not implemented. The strategy compares oldCatalog.name with the catalog parsed from the new name and fails fast before building the RenameV2ViewExec.

Solutions

Rename within the same catalog: ALTER VIEW cat1.db.v RENAME TO cat1.db.v2.
To move a catalog, create the view in the target catalog (CREATE VIEW ... AS SELECT * FROM old) and drop the original.
Remove the unintended catalog prefix so the new name resolves to the source catalog.
Check Spark3Util.catalogAndIdentifier output by logging/spark.sql which catalog the new name binds to.

Example fix

-- before
ALTER VIEW cat1.db.metrics_summary RENAME TO cat2.db.metrics_summary;
-- after
ALTER VIEW cat1.db.metrics_summary RENAME TO cat1.db.metrics_summary_v2;

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

val target = Spark3Util.catalogAndIdentifier(spark, newName)
if (target.catalog().name() != sourceCatalogName) throw new AnalysisException("rename must stay within the source catalog")

Try / catch

try { spark.sql(s"ALTER VIEW $oldName RENAME TO $newName") } catch { case e: org.apache.spark.sql.AnalysisException if e.getMessage.contains("Cannot move view between catalogs") => log.error("cross-catalog view rename unsupported; recreate view instead") }

Prevention

Never include a different catalog prefix in the RENAME TO name
To relocate a view, CREATE VIEW in the target catalog then DROP the original
Remember the session default catalog is used when the new name has no catalog prefix

When it happens

Trigger: ALTER VIEW cat1.db.v RENAME TO cat2.db.v2 where Spark3Util.catalogAndIdentifier resolves the new name to catalog cat2, different from the view's source catalog cat1.

Common situations: Users assuming RENAME can move views across catalogs like a copy+drop; default-catalog resolution silently picking the session catalog instead of the source catalog; migration scripts rewriting view names with a different catalog prefix.

Understand the failure class

Background: UnsupportedOperationException and "is not supported" errors: when a library deliberately refuses a call — this error's family across 30 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of apache/iceberg@86d9c8fc54 (2026-09-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/af94822ccfddfb27. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at spark/v3.5/spark-extensions/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/v2/ExtendedDataSourceV2Strategy.scala:132

    case SetIdentifierFields(IcebergCatalogAndIdentifier(catalog, ident), fields) =>
      SetIdentifierFieldsExec(catalog, ident, fields) :: Nil

    case DropIdentifierFields(IcebergCatalogAndIdentifier(catalog, ident), fields) =>
      DropIdentifierFieldsExec(catalog, ident, fields) :: Nil

    case SetWriteDistributionAndOrdering(
          IcebergCatalogAndIdentifier(catalog, ident),
          distributionMode,
          ordering) =>
      SetWriteDistributionAndOrderingExec(catalog, ident, distributionMode, ordering) :: Nil

    case OrderAwareCoalesce(numPartitions, coalescer, child) =>
      OrderAwareCoalesceExec(numPartitions, coalescer, planLater(child)) :: Nil

    case RenameTable(ResolvedV2View(oldCatalog: ViewCatalog, oldIdent), newName, isView @ true) =>
      val newIdent = Spark3Util.catalogAndIdentifier(spark, newName.toList.asJava)
      if (oldCatalog.name != newIdent.catalog().name()) {
        throw new AnalysisException(
          s"Cannot move view between catalogs: from=${oldCatalog.name} and to=${newIdent.catalog().name()}")
      }
      RenameV2ViewExec(oldCatalog, oldIdent, newIdent.identifier()) :: Nil

    case DropIcebergView(ResolvedIdentifier(viewCatalog: ViewCatalog, ident), ifExists) =>
      DropV2ViewExec(viewCatalog, ident, ifExists) :: Nil

    case CreateIcebergView(
          ResolvedIdentifier(viewCatalog: ViewCatalog, ident),
          queryText,
          query,
          columnAliases,
          columnComments,
          queryColumnNames,
          comment,
          properties,
          allowExisting,
          replace,

View on GitHub (pinned to 86d9c8fc54)