KB73059111: Automation Engine - Application Server error appears when you right-click a file (or a folder) inside a Job

Summary

This Application Server error appears when, inside an Automation Engine Job, you right-click a file (or folder) to open the contextual menu:

"An error occurred while processing your request. Please try again."

Symptoms

In the Automation Engine Pilot, the following error appears in the contextual menu of a file (or a folder) inside a job:

An error occurred while processing your request. Please try again.
If the problem persists, please restart the Pilot.
If the problem still occurs after restarting the Pilot, please restart the Application Server.

On a Mac client, this can freeze the Automation Engine Pilot.

In the Server Admin web page, tab 'Server Checks' you will see an error for the application server. It indicates the database for the application server is not running.

Cause

Such problems are mostly caused by a connection issue to the FastTrack database.  You can find this by clicking More info on the error message. 

This problem can also happen when you are not using the commercial printing tools, since AE's Layout module also started using the Application Server.

Solution

For Automation Engine 12.x and older, run the Application Server Database Connection Administration tool.

1. Navigate to Start > All Programs > Application Server > Tools > Database Connection Administration.
2. Select the option: Configure the connection to use the locally installed default database engine (SQL Server 2000/2005/2008 named instance EG_APPSRV_JBOSS).
3. This will create the Fastlane_JBoss database to avoid the issue.

For Automation Engine 14.x and newer:

1. Go the the Server Admin web page and login.
2. Go to the Databases tab.
3. Unlock the padlock and login with the SA user.
4. Click the + button and create a new database based on an empty database.
5. Define a name (appserver) and an output path for the MDF and LDF files.
6. Navigate to Start > All Programs > Application Server > Tools > Database Connection Administration.
7. Select the option: Configure the connection to use the locally installed default database engine (SQL Server 2000/2005/2008 unnamed instance).
8. Fill in the hostname and the database name. Enter the login credentials for the admin user.
9. Click Create.
10. This will create the correct tables in the database.
11. Go the Automation Engine Pilot: Tools > Configure > Automation Engine databases > Application Server.
12. Enter the hostname of the machine running the database.
13. Select the appserver database.
14. Enter the credentials for the admin user.
15. Click Apply.