flowable/flowable-engine · error · FlowableException

deployment '<deploymentId>' didn't put case definition '<cas

Error message

deployment '<deploymentId>' didn't put case definition '<caseDefinitionId>' in the cache

What it means

resolveCaseDefinition cannot find the definition in cache, reloads its deployment from the database and redeploys it to repopulate the cache. If after redeploying, the deployment still did not register the requested case definition in the cache, it throws FlowableException — an internal invariant violation indicating inconsistent deployment data (e.g. the case definition row points to a deployment whose resources no longer produce it).

Source

Thrown at modules/flowable-cmmn-engine/src/main/java/org/flowable/cmmn/engine/impl/deployer/CmmnDeploymentManager.java:118

        }
        caseDefinition = resolveCaseDefinition(caseDefinition).getCaseDefinition();
        return caseDefinition;
    }

    public CaseDefinitionCacheEntry resolveCaseDefinition(CaseDefinition caseDefinition) {
        String caseDefinitionId = caseDefinition.getId();
        String deploymentId = caseDefinition.getDeploymentId();

        CaseDefinitionCacheEntry cachedCaseDefinition = caseDefinitionCache.get(caseDefinitionId);

        if (cachedCaseDefinition == null) {
            CmmnDeploymentEntity deployment = deploymentEntityManager.findById(deploymentId);
            deployment.setNew(false);
            deploy(deployment, null);
            cachedCaseDefinition = deployment.getCaseDefinitionCacheEntry(caseDefinitionId);

            if (cachedCaseDefinition == null) {
                throw new FlowableException("deployment '" + deploymentId + "' didn't put case definition '" + caseDefinitionId + "' in the cache");
            }
        }
        return cachedCaseDefinition;
    }
    
    public void removeDeployment(String deploymentId) {
        removeDeployment(deploymentId, true);
    }
    
    public void removeDeployment(String deploymentId, boolean cascade) {
        CmmnDeploymentEntity deployment = deploymentEntityManager.findById(deploymentId);
        if (deployment == null) {
            throw new FlowableObjectNotFoundException("Could not find a deployment with id '" + deploymentId + "'.", CmmnDeploymentEntity.class);
        }
        
        List<EngineDeployer> engineUnDeployers = new ArrayList<>(deployers);
        engineUnDeployers.sort(Comparator.comparingInt(EngineDeployer::getUndeployOrder));

View on GitHub (pinned to d6d39ce1c6)

Solutions

  1. Check DB consistency: ensure the case definition's DEPLOYMENT_ID points to a deployment whose byte arrays for the resource still exist
  2. Re-run the Flowable schema tooling / restore a consistent database backup
  3. Redeploy the case model fresh and update references to the new definition id

Example fix

// before (DB rows manually copied without ACT_GE_BYTEARRAY content)
-- deployment exists but no .cmmn resource bytes -> cache repopulation fails
// after
repositoryService.createDeployment().addClasspathResource("credit.cmmn").deploy();
// and use the new definition id returned by the deployment
Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Try / catch

try { def = resolveDefinition(id); } catch (FlowableException e) { if (e.getMessage().contains("didn't put case definition")) { triggerConsistencyAlarm(); } }

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: A case definition row in the DB whose parent deployment's resources are missing/corrupt (partially deleted database, manual row manipulation, restore from backup mismatch) so re-deployment parses nothing matching caseDefinitionId.

Common situations: Restored or manually pruned ACT_CMMN_* tables where FK relationships broke; upgrading Flowable versions against an old schema; deleting resources from ACT_GE_BYTEARRAY directly.

Understand the failure class

Background: "This is a bug, please report it": internal invariant violations, unreachable panics, and SNH errors explained — this error's family across 47 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/976b3e9764633318. Report an issue: GitHub.