Informix Error -569: Cannot reference an external database with logging.

Reasons / Common Causes

-569 is the mirror image of -568: it fires when a statement in the current (unlogged) database references an external database that does use transaction logging — per the official guidance, all databases participating in a single transaction must either all use logging or all not use it.

1. A cross-database reference from an unlogged database to a logged one, per the official guidance — the direct, only cause.
2. An unlogged staging/scratch database (created without logging for load performance) referencing a logged application database within the same transaction.
3. A database's logging mode changed after cross-database SQL was already written against it, turning previously valid cross-database statements into ones that now violate this rule.

Solutions / Resolution

1. Make the databases' logging modes consistent, per the official guidance's underlying requirement — either add logging to the current (unlogged) database, or restructure the operation to avoid a same-transaction cross-database reference.
2. Move data between the databases via unload/load instead of an in-transaction cross-database reference, if the unlogged database's lack of logging is intentional.
3. Check a database's logging mode before writing cross-database SQL against it:

   SELECT name, is_logging FROM sysmaster:sysdatabases WHERE name = 'target_db';
   

Examples

The disallowed cross-database reference

DATABASE unlogged_scratch_db;  -- no logging
SELECT * FROM logged_app_db:orders;
-- -569: logged_app_db uses logging

Checking logging modes first

SELECT name, is_logging FROM sysmaster:sysdatabases
WHERE name IN ('unlogged_scratch_db', 'logged_app_db');

Diagnostic Checks

1. Query sysmaster:sysdatabases for the is_logging status of both the current and the referenced external database, to confirm the mismatch before deciding how to resolve it.

Related Errors / Related Topics

• -568 — "Cannot reference an external database without logging." The mirror-image restriction: a logged current database referencing an unlogged external one.
• -570 — "Cannot reference an external ANSI database." The same family of cross-database mode consistency restrictions, for ANSI compliance rather than logging.

The mirror image of -568 — same underlying rule (all databases in a transaction must share a logging mode), triggered from the opposite direction.