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Informix Error -387

-387 No connect permission.

You cannot access the database that this statement requests because you have not been granted CONNECT privilege to it. Contact a person who has Database Administrator privilege to that database and ask to be granted CONNECT privileges to it.

Oninit® Troubleshooting Guidance

Reasons / Common Causes

-387 is a straightforward database-level privilege check: the current user was never granted CONNECT privilege on the target database — one of the three database-level privileges (CONNECT, DBA, RESOURCE) mentioned alongside -353, and the minimum one needed to access a database at all.

  1. A user account that was never granted CONNECT on the target database — the most common cause, especially for newly created accounts.
  2. A user whose CONNECT privilege was later revoked — for example, during an access review or account deprovisioning that wasn't fully reverted.
  3. An application connecting to the wrong database where its service account genuinely doesn't have access, as opposed to the one it was intended to use.
Solutions / Resolution
  1. Contact a database administrator to grant CONNECT privilege, per the official guidance:
    GRANT CONNECT TO app_user;
  2. Verify the account is connecting to the intended database — if privileges look correct but the error persists, confirm the database name itself.
  3. Check whether CONNECT was previously granted and later revoked, if this is a regression on a previously working account.
Examples
Granting the missing privilege
GRANT CONNECT TO app_user;
Checking current privileges before escalating to a DBA
SELECT t.tabname, a.grantee FROM systabauth a, systables t
WHERE a.tabid = t.tabid AND a.grantee = 'app_user';
-- CONNECT is a database-level privilege, so it isn't listed
-- against a specific table — check with a DBA directly if unsure
Diagnostic Checks
  1. Confirm which database the connection is actually targeting, in case the wrong database is the real issue rather than a genuine privilege gap.
  2. Check with a DBA whether CONNECT was ever granted, and whether it was later revoked.
Related Errors / Related Topics
  • -353 — "No table or view specified when granting/revoking privileges." A related GRANT/REVOKE structural error — explains the distinction between database-level privileges like CONNECT and table-level ones.
  • -329 — "Database not found or no system permission." A related database-access error, though about the database not being locatable at all rather than a specific privilege gap on a database that is found.

CONNECT is a database-level privilege, granted without an ON table_name clause — a DBA needs to grant it directly to resolve this.