pentaho/pentaho-kettle · error · KettleException

Mail.Exception.CouldnotFindAttachedContentFileNameField

Error message

Mail.Exception.CouldnotFindAttachedContentFileNameField

What it means

'Attach content from field' is enabled and both required field names were set, but the attached-content filename field does not exist in the incoming row. The indexOfValue lookup in cacheFieldsPosition returned -1 and this KettleException is thrown.

Solutions

1. Check the attachment filename field name in the Mail step against the actual input stream fields (exact, case-sensitive match).
2. Preview the upstream hop to verify the filename field is produced.
3. Disable 'Attach content from field' to attach physical files instead.

Example fix

// before
// attachContentFileNameField = "filename" but stream field is "report_name"
// after
// meta.setAttachContentFileNameField("report_name");

if (meta.isAttachContentFromField()
    && meta.getAttachContentFileNameField() != null && !meta.getAttachContentFileNameField().isEmpty()
    && rowMeta.indexOfValue(meta.getAttachContentFileNameField()) < 0) {
  throw new KettleException("Attached content filename field not found: " + meta.getAttachContentFileNameField());
}

try { sendMail(); } catch (KettleException e) { if (e.getMessage().contains("CouldnotFindAttachedContentFileNameField")) { logError("Attachment filename field not present in the input stream"); } throw e; }

When it happens

Trigger: meta.isAttachContentFromField() is true, attachedContentFileNameField is non-empty, and data.previousRowMeta.indexOfValue(attachedContentFileNameField) < 0.

Common situations: Filename field name typo; upstream step renamed the filename column; step copied between transformations with different schemas.

Related errors

• Mail.Exception.AttachedContentFieldEmpty
• Mail.Exception.AttachedContentFileNameFieldEmpty
• Mail.Exception.CouldnotFindAttachedContentField
• Mail.Exception.CouldnotSourceAttachedZipFilenameField
• Mail.Exception.CouldnotFindAuthenticationPassField

AI-assisted analysis of pentaho/pentaho-kettle@f3058517a1 (2026-09-13). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b5b66b13c8542f83. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at plugins/mail/impl/src/main/java/org/pentaho/di/trans/steps/mail/Mail.java:429

      if ( Utils.isEmpty( attachedContentField ) ) {
        // Empty Field
        throw new KettleException( BaseMessages.getString( PKG, "Mail.Exception.AttachedContentFieldEmpty" ) );
      }
      data.indexOfAttachedContent = data.previousRowMeta.indexOfValue( attachedContentField );
      if ( data.indexOfAttachedContent < 0 ) {
        throw new KettleException( BaseMessages.getString(
          PKG, "Mail.Exception.CouldnotFindAttachedContentField", attachedContentField ) );
      }
      // Attached content filename
      String attachedContentFileNameField = meta.getAttachContentFileNameField();
      if ( Utils.isEmpty( attachedContentFileNameField ) ) {
        // Empty Field
        throw new KettleException( BaseMessages.getString(
          PKG, "Mail.Exception.AttachedContentFileNameFieldEmpty" ) );
      }
      data.IndexOfAttachedFilename = data.previousRowMeta.indexOfValue( attachedContentFileNameField );
      if ( data.IndexOfAttachedFilename < 0 ) {
        throw new KettleException( BaseMessages.getString(
          PKG, "Mail.Exception.CouldnotFindAttachedContentFileNameField", attachedContentFileNameField ) );
      }
    } else {

      // Dynamic Zipfilename
      if ( meta.isZipFilenameDynamic() ) {
        // cache the position of the attached source filename field
        if ( data.indexOfDynamicZipFilename < 0 ) {
          String realZipFilename = meta.getDynamicZipFilenameField();
          data.indexOfDynamicZipFilename = data.previousRowMeta.indexOfValue( realZipFilename );
          if ( data.indexOfDynamicZipFilename < 0 ) {
            throw new KettleException( BaseMessages.getString(
              PKG, "Mail.Exception.CouldnotSourceAttachedZipFilenameField", realZipFilename ) );
          }
        }
      }
      data.zipFileLimit = Const.toLong( environmentSubstitute( meta.getZipLimitSize() ), 0 );
      if ( data.zipFileLimit > 0 ) {

View on GitHub (pinned to f3058517a1)