Hi.  I have a DNN 7.2.1 site that gives the following error whenever I make a change within Site Settings, and I click "Update":

Error: Site Settings is currently unavailable.DotNetNuke.Services.Exceptions.ModuleLoadException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object. ---> System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object. at DesktopModules.Admin.Portals.SiteSettings.UpdatePortal(Object sender, EventArgs e) in C:\DNN\DesktopModules\Admin\Portals\SiteSettings.ascx.cs:line 1155 --- End of inner exception stack trace ---

The line of code that is being referenced is as follows:
var portal = new PortalInfo

I don't know if this has any bearing on the issue, but the site went through a couple of upgrades earlier this year:
5.6.8 -> 6.2.8 -> 7.0.6 -> 7.1.2 -> 7.2.1

I can generate the error by trying to change a setting on the "Basic Settings" such as the "Edit Skin".  I can also generate the error when I change a setting on the "Advanced Settings" tab such as "Enable Pop-Ups".  The error occurs when I click "Update", and the changes are never saved.

Does any one have any suggestions?  Thanks!

See Ya!
Van
P.S.  My "work around" is to hit the PortalSettings table directly via an update statement to make the change like so:

UPDATE DB.dbo.PortalSettings SET SettingValue = '[G]Skins/Skin1/Skin1.ascx' WHERE (SettingName = 'DefaultAdminSkin') AND (PortalID = 0)

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See Ya! Van

Sebastian:

Thanks for the great suggestion!  I checked it out this morning.  Unfortunately, I didn't find any duplicate records.

I checked my work log, and I had successfully updated the Site Settings back on 4/7/14.  All of the DNN upgrades occurred back in February and March, so Site Settings was definitely working after I had upgraded the site to DNN 7.2.1.  Therefore, I don't think that this issue is related to the site being upgraded.  I'm mentioning this because I see a lot of posts about similar errors that occurred after a particular site was upgraded.

Something has changed in this DNN installation in the past 3 weeks that is causing this issue.  I'll keep digging around.  If/when I finally figure it out, I'll definitely post back here.

See Ya!
Van

P.S.  If anyone else is curious about how to find duplicate records in the PortalSettings table, here's a query that will do the job:

SELECT COUNT(SettingValue) FROM DB.dbo.PortalSettings
WHERE PortalID = 0
GROUP BY SettingName
HAVING COUNT(SettingValue) > 1

Or if you don't trust the "Group By" and "Having" commands, you can just list the contents of the table in order of SettingName and scan that column to find dupes:

SELECT * FROM DB.dbo.PortalSettings
WHERE PortalID = 0
ORDER BY SettingName

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See Ya! Van

Van, I am glad you were able to figure it out and solve it. Viewstate is needed to maintain the status of each control - currently it is contained for more than just edit control, this will be optimized in DNN 7.3.0.
Regarding your duplicate search, I would suggest running the following statement in Host > SQL:
SELECT PortalID, SettingName
FROM {databaseOwner}[{objectQualifier]PortalSettings]
GROUP BY PortalID, SettingName
HAVING COUNT(SettingValue) > 1

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Cheers from Germany,
Sebastian Leupold

   

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