REP-0004 INVOKING THE ORACLE REPORTS BUILDER

REP-0004 INVOKING THE ORACLE REPORTS BUILDER (Doc ID 1013620.6)

APPLIES TO:

Oracle Reports Developer - Version 6.0 to 11.1.2.2.0 [Release 6 to 11g]
Oracle Application Object Library - Version 11.0.0 to 12.1 [Release 11 to 12.1]
Generic UNIX
Checked for relevance on 20-Oct-2015

SYMPTOMS

You are receiving the following error from Oracle Reports:

REP-0004 : Warning - Unable to open user preference file.

 There may also be other errors like:

REP-0003  - Warning - Unable to open global preference file.

REP-3000 - Internal error starting Oracle Toolkit.

CAUSE

 There are several causes of this error.

SOLUTION

Possible causes and solutions of REP-0004 include the following:

1.  No prefs.ora file in HOME directory:

Oracle Reports will look into the user's HOME directory for the prefs.ora preferences file.
 If a prefs.ora file does not exist in your HOME directory, you can copy the prefs.ora
file that came with the Oracle Tools.

A prefs.ora file is shipped with the Oracle Tools, and is located in:

$ORACLE_HOME/tools/admin/prefs.ora

You can also create a prefs.ora file the first time you are in the Reports Builder

To create a prefs.ora file from the Oracle Reports Builder

Oracle Reports 6.0.X:

Start the Oracle Reports Builder
Select Tools->Preferences
Select your preferences
Press the OK button
This will save a prefs.ora file in your HOME directory when you exit Reports Builder.
Oracle Reports 9.x / 10.x /11.x:

Start the Oracle Reports Builder
Select Edit->Preferences
Select your preferences
Press the OK button
This will save a prefs.ora file in your HOME directory when you exit Reports Builder.

2.  Location of the prefs.ora file:

If you want to use a prefs.ora file in a different directory than HOME (for versions < 11g) or
ORACLE_INSTANCE/config/FRComponent/frcommon/tools/admin/ for 11g, set the
 $ORACLE_LOCALPREFERENCE environment variable to that directory.

Example:  You want all users to access a common prefs.ora file located in /home/allusers/prefs.ora.

% setenv ORACLE_LOCALPREFERENCE /home/allusers

              OR

% export ORACLE_LOCALPREFERENCE=/home/allusers

3.  Insufficient privileges on the prefs.ora file:

The user invoking Oracle Reports must have read privileges on the prefs.ora file.  

4.  A system error made it impossible to open the file. 

The preferences file may have become corrupted.  If you suspect file corruption,
copy $ORACLE_HOME/tools/admin/prefs.ora and respecify your preferences.  

Note:
Oracle Forms and Oracle Graphics also read prefs.ora, thus you will have to respecify
all preferences that were set in the corrupted prefs.ora file.
Consult your operating system documentation or contact your system administrator for assistance
 setting environment variables or file privileges.