pentaho/pentaho-kettle · error · KettleFileException

: Unknown storage type " + getStorageType()

Error message

 : Unknown storage type " + getStorageType()

What it means

Thrown by ValueMetaTimestamp.writeData when the object's storage type is not one of the writable types, producing an unknown-storage-type KettleFileException during binary row serialization to a DataOutputStream.

Solutions

  1. Fix storage type with setStorageType before writing
  2. Convert the object to normal storage (convertToNormalStorageTypes) prior to writeData
  3. Regenerate the transformation metadata in the current PDI version

Example fix

// before
// meta has invalid storageType
meta.writeData(outputStream, object);
// after
meta.setStorageType(ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_NORMAL);
meta.writeData(outputStream, object);
Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

if (meta.getStorageType() < ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_NORMAL || meta.getStorageType() > ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_INDEXED) {
  meta.setStorageType(ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_NORMAL);
}

Type guard

boolean writableStorageType(ValueMetaInterface vm) {
  return vm.getStorageType() == ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_NORMAL || vm.getStorageType() == ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_BINARY_STRING || vm.getStorageType() == ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_INDEXED;
}

Try / catch

try {
  meta.writeData(outputStream, object);
} catch (KettleFileException e) {
  logError("Write failed: " + e.getMessage());
  meta.setStorageType(ValueMetaInterface.STORAGE_TYPE_NORMAL);
  meta.writeData(outputStream, meta.getNormalStorageType(object));
}

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: Writing a row to a Kettle split file/socket stream where the timestamp meta has an undefined storage type (same corruption path as error 546) — the switch's default branch fires.

Common situations: Version-mismatched metadata in clustered/trans-morri? (clustered runs), hand-constructed ValueMeta objects used in custom file output steps.

Understand the failure class

Background: Invalid enum value errors: "Unknown type", "Invalid scope", "must be one of" — when a string is not on the library's allowed list — this error's family across 23 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of pentaho/pentaho-kettle@f3058517a1 (2026-09-13). Data as JSON: /api/errors/d7b8f7278698165b. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at core/src/main/java/org/pentaho/di/core/row/value/ValueMetaTimestamp.java:606

            outputStream.writeInt( timestamp.getNanos() );
            break;

          case STORAGE_TYPE_BINARY_STRING:
            // Handle binary string content -- only when not NULL
            // In this case, we opt not to convert anything at all for speed.
            // That way, we can save on CPU power.
            // Since the streams can be compressed, volume shouldn't be an issue
            // at all.
            //
            writeBinaryString( outputStream, (byte[]) object );
            break;

          case STORAGE_TYPE_INDEXED:
            writeInteger( outputStream, (Integer) object ); // just an index
            break;

          default:
            throw new KettleFileException( toString() + " : Unknown storage type " + getStorageType() );
        }
      }
    } catch ( ClassCastException e ) {
      throw new RuntimeException( toString() + " : There was a data type error: the data type of "
        + object.getClass().getName() + " object [" + object + "] does not correspond to value meta ["
        + toStringMeta() + "]" );
    } catch ( IOException e ) {
      throw new KettleFileException( toString() + " : Unable to write value timestamp data to output stream", e );
    } catch ( KettleValueException e ) {
      throw new RuntimeException( toString() + " : There was a data type error: the data type of "
        + object.getClass().getName() + " object [" + object + "] does not correspond to value meta ["
        + toStringMeta() + "]" );
    }
  }

  @Override
  public Object readData( DataInputStream inputStream ) throws KettleFileException, KettleEOFException,
    SocketTimeoutException {

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