Deploying content to SmartTarget failing

Question

I've some content that is failing to deploy to ST, here's the error log:

2015-04-19 19:53:02,702 ERROR DeployPipelineExecutor - Unable to execute onSuccess event in phase: Deployment Commit Phase for transaction: tcm:0-2012-66560
2015-04-19 19:53:02,703 ERROR DeployPipelineExecutor - Original stacktrace for transaction: tcm:0-2012-66560
com.tridion.deployer.ProcessingException: Failed during the post-transaction phase.
    at com.tridion.deployer.phases.CommitPhase.onSuccess(CommitPhase.java:124) ~[cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.phases.DeployPipelineExecutor.runSafeEvent(DeployPipelineExecutor.java:241) [cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.phases.DeployPipelineExecutor.doExecute(DeployPipelineExecutor.java:101) [cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.phases.DeployPipelineExecutor.execute(DeployPipelineExecutor.java:64) [cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.TransactionManager.handleDeployPackage(TransactionManager.java:82) [cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.queue.QueueLocationHandler$1.run(QueueLocationHandler.java:180) [cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at java.util.concurrent.Executors$RunnableAdapter.call(Unknown Source) [na:1.7.0_75]
    at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(Unknown Source) [na:1.7.0_75]
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(Unknown Source) [na:1.7.0_75]
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(Unknown Source) [na:1.7.0_75]
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source) [na:1.7.0_75]
Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException: null
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.utils.ParamHelper.escapeIdentifier(ParamHelper.java:139) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.utils.SmartTargetXMLUtils.generateFredhopperAttribute(SmartTargetXMLUtils.java:87) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.utils.SmartTargetXMLUtils.generateFredhopperAttribute(SmartTargetXMLUtils.java:66) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.deployer.FredhopperOutputBuilder.executeDataProviders(FredhopperOutputBuilder.java:190) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.deployer.FredhopperOutputBuilder.appendFredHopperItem(FredhopperOutputBuilder.java:171) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.deployer.FredhopperDeployerModule.process(FredhopperDeployerModule.java:67) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.Processor.process(Processor.java:109) ~[cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.workers.ProcessorWorker.doWork(ProcessorWorker.java:77) ~[cd_deployer.jar:na]
    at com.tridion.deployer.phases.CommitPhase.onSuccess(CommitPhase.java:116) ~[cd_deployer.jar:na]

My configurations all seem to be sound, so I'm wondering if anyone has a bit more information as to what's happening at this point:

Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException: null
    at com.tridion.smarttarget.utils.ParamHelper.escapeIdentifier(ParamHelper.java:139) ~[smarttarget_core.jar:na]

... before I take smarttarget_core.jar to pieces to take a look.

Answer 1

John and I had a short troubleshooting session yesterday and it turns out that this particular problem was caused by an error while loading the configuration -- due to the URL for the Index server being invalid (it was missing "http://"). As such, the other properties were not loaded such as the DefaultUniverse (which will otherwise never be null)

This quickly because clear after viewing the full log hint hint :)

Answer 2

It seems tha the null error is coming by a debug trace, that is trying to acces a null value. Tha value is the configuration element

<DefaultUniverse>catalog01</DefaultUniverse>

You can try to deactivate the DEBUG level of the logs to check if the error goes away, but check this configuration value at the begining of the smarttarget_conf.xml