flowable/flowable-engine · error · IllegalArgumentException

Expected eventRegistryEngine configuration to be of type…

Error message

Expected eventRegistryEngine configuration to be of type class org.flowable.eventregistry.spring.SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration but was ...

What it means

SpringEventRegistryConfigurator.configure requires the injected eventEngineConfiguration to be a SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration. If a different EventRegistryEngineConfiguration subclass (or incompatible configuration) was set, it throws IllegalArgumentException showing the expected and actual types.

Solutions

Set the configuration to a SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration instance (or leave it null to let the configurator create one).
Remove any conflicting eventRegistryEngineConfiguration bean/property of the wrong type.
Align your engine setup with the Spring configurator's expectations (SpringEngineConfiguration parent).
Check classpath for duplicate flowable-event-registry versions pulling in the wrong configuration class.

Example fix

// before
configurator.setEventEngineConfiguration(new EventRegistryEngineConfiguration());
// after
configurator.setEventEngineConfiguration(new SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration());

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

if (eventEngineConfiguration != null
        && !(eventEngineConfiguration instanceof SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration)) {
    throw new IllegalArgumentException("Use SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration with the Spring configurator");
}

Type guard

null

Try / catch

try {
    configurator.configure(engineConfiguration);
} catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
    logger.error("Wrong event registry config type: {}", e.getMessage());
}

Prevention

Only inject SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration into the Spring configurator
Leave the config null to let the configurator create a default
Check for duplicate/conflicting flowable-event-registry versions on the classpath

When it happens

Trigger: Programmatically or via Spring XML/properties setting eventRegistryEngineConfiguration to a non-Spring EventRegistryEngineConfiguration before the configurator runs.

Common situations: Mixing plain (non-Spring) event registry configuration with the Spring configurator; copy-pasted engine configuration from a non-Spring boot setup; bean of wrong type auto-wired into the configurator.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/54da701ceb4c9707. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at modules/flowable-event-registry-spring-configurator/src/main/java/org/flowable/eventregistry/spring/configurator/SpringEventRegistryConfigurator.java:32

import org.flowable.common.engine.impl.AbstractEngineConfiguration;
import org.flowable.common.spring.SpringEngineConfiguration;
import org.flowable.eventregistry.impl.configurator.EventRegistryEngineConfigurator;
import org.flowable.eventregistry.spring.SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration;

/**
 * @author Tijs Rademakers
 * @author Joram Barrez
 */
public class SpringEventRegistryConfigurator extends EventRegistryEngineConfigurator {

    @Override
    public void configure(AbstractEngineConfiguration engineConfiguration) {
        if (eventEngineConfiguration == null) {
            eventEngineConfiguration = new SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration();

        } else if (!(eventEngineConfiguration instanceof SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration)) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Expected eventRegistryEngine configuration to be of type "
                + SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration.class + " but was " + eventEngineConfiguration.getClass());

        }

        initialiseCommonProperties(engineConfiguration, eventEngineConfiguration);
        SpringEngineConfiguration springEngineConfiguration = (SpringEngineConfiguration) engineConfiguration;
        ((SpringEventRegistryEngineConfiguration) eventEngineConfiguration).setTransactionManager(springEngineConfiguration.getTransactionManager());

        if (eventEngineConfiguration.getBeans() == null) {
            eventEngineConfiguration.setBeans(engineConfiguration.getBeans());
        }

        initEngine();
        initServiceConfigurations(engineConfiguration, eventEngineConfiguration);
    }

}

View on GitHub (pinned to d6d39ce1c6)