PnP Provisioning Error: Field not found Issue with the Repost Page Content Type

Posted on June 6, 2018 by pgbhoyar

Recently we encountered an error in the provisioning process using PnP Provisioning Engine in SharePoint Online. The processing process was working fine from last 1.5 years and suddenly in the middle of May 2018, it started failing with the following error message.

“Failed to apply template, retying in 1 min: Invalid field name. {746bb255-b0f7-47d5-9a3e-1c8e52468420}”. This field is part of the out of the box “Repost Page” content type.

To resolve this issue, we need to recreate the source template in SharePoint Online/Office 356. If you would like to know how I came to this conclusion, then continue reading.

When we encounter this issue, I have logged it on GitHub and found that few other folks also encountered the same issue. I did a quick POC and provisioning process was working as expected for newly created source site collections. I compared the schema of the old source and new source and found that the schema for “Repost Page” content type has changed significantly in last 1.5 years in SharePoint Online. One of the key change was the field “Authors” is no longer present in the new schema.

Old Schema:

<pnp:ContentType ID=”0x0101009D1CB255DA76424F860D91F20E6C4118002A50BFCFB7614729B56886FADA02339B” Name=”Repost Page” Description=”Create a new repost page.” Group=”Document Content Types” NewFormUrl=”” EditFormUrl=”” DisplayFormUrl=””>

<pnp:FieldRefs>

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”c042a256-787d-4a6f-8a8a-cf6ab767f12d” Name=”ContentType” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”5f47e085-2150-41dc-b661-442f3027f552″ Name=”SelectFilename” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”8553196d-ec8d-4564-9861-3dbe931050c8″ Name=”FileLeafRef” Required=”true” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”8c06beca-0777-48f7-91c7-6da68bc07b69″ Name=”Created” Hidden=”true” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”fa564e0f-0c70-4ab9-b863-0177e6ddd247″ Name=”Title” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”28cf69c5-fa48-462a-b5cd-27b6f9d2bd5f” Name=”Modified” Hidden=”true” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”822c78e3-1ea9-4943-b449-57863ad33ca9″ Name=”Modified_x0020_By” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”4dd7e525-8d6b-4cb4-9d3e-44ee25f973eb” Name=”Created_x0020_By” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”82642ec8-ef9b-478f-acf9-31f7d45fbc31″ Name=”LinkTitle” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”7efc33c1-b56b-490e-9c9b-1097e971ba96″ Name=”ClientSideApplicationId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”daef58d7-ccfd-43fc-b776-2e292cc66bba” Name=”PageLayoutType” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”4966388e-6e12-4bc6-8990-5b5b66153eae” Name=”CanvasContent1″ />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”5baf6db5-9d25-4738-b15e-db5789298e82″ Name=”BannerImageUrl” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”fb3259ac-bd07-4397-b7aa-03e885b0838e” Name=”BannerImageOffset” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”3f155110-a6a2-4d70-926c-94648101f0e8″ Name=”Description” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”f5ad16a2-85be-46b2-b5f0-2bb8b4a5074a” Name=”PromotedState” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”c84f8697-331e-457d-884a-c4fb8f30ea74″ Name=”FirstPublishedDate” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”261075db-0525-4fb8-a6ea-772014186599″ Name=”LayoutWebpartsContent” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”746bb255-b0f7-47d5-9a3e-1c8e52468420″ Name=”Authors” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”8a8804d8-ad51-48ef-9acf-0df7b3cc7ef6″ Name=”OriginalSourceUrl” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”0e7b982f-698a-4d0c-aacb-f16906f66d30″ Name=”_OriginalSourceUrl” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”36193413-dd5c-4096-8c1e-1b40098b9ba3″ Name=”_OriginalSourceSiteId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”3477a5bc-c605-4b2e-a7c1-8db8f13c017e” Name=”_OriginalSourceWebId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”139da674-dbf6-439f-98e0-4eb05fa9a669″ Name=”_OriginalSourceListId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”91e86a43-75f2-426f-80da-35edfb47d55d” Name=”_OriginalSourceItemId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”1a7348e7-1bb7-4a47-9790-088e7cb20b58″ Name=”_AuthorByline” />

</pnp:FieldRefs>

<pnp:DocumentTemplate TargetName=”/_layouts/15/CreateSitePage.aspx” />

</pnp:ContentType>

New Schema:

<pnp:ContentType ID=”0x0101009D1CB255DA76424F860D91F20E6C4118002A50BFCFB7614729B56886FADA02339B” Name=”Repost Page” Description=”Create a new repost page.” Group=”Document Content Types” NewFormUrl=”” EditFormUrl=”” DisplayFormUrl=””>

<pnp:FieldRefs>

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”8553196d-ec8d-4564-9861-3dbe931050c8″ Name=”FileLeafRef” Required=”true” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”fa564e0f-0c70-4ab9-b863-0177e6ddd247″ Name=”Title” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”4966388e-6e12-4bc6-8990-5b5b66153eae” Name=”CanvasContent1″ />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”5baf6db5-9d25-4738-b15e-db5789298e82″ Name=”BannerImageUrl” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”f5ad16a2-85be-46b2-b5f0-2bb8b4a5074a” Name=”PromotedState” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”c84f8697-331e-457d-884a-c4fb8f30ea74″ Name=”FirstPublishedDate” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”261075db-0525-4fb8-a6ea-772014186599″ Name=”LayoutWebpartsContent” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”0e7b982f-698a-4d0c-aacb-f16906f66d30″ Name=”_OriginalSourceUrl” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”36193413-dd5c-4096-8c1e-1b40098b9ba3″ Name=”_OriginalSourceSiteId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”3477a5bc-c605-4b2e-a7c1-8db8f13c017e” Name=”_OriginalSourceWebId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”139da674-dbf6-439f-98e0-4eb05fa9a669″ Name=”_OriginalSourceListId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”91e86a43-75f2-426f-80da-35edfb47d55d” Name=”_OriginalSourceItemId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”1a7348e7-1bb7-4a47-9790-088e7cb20b58″ Name=”_AuthorByline” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”fb3259ac-bd07-4397-b7aa-03e885b0838e” Name=”BannerImageOffset” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”3f155110-a6a2-4d70-926c-94648101f0e8″ Name=”Description” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”5f47e085-2150-41dc-b661-442f3027f552″ Name=”SelectFilename” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”28cf69c5-fa48-462a-b5cd-27b6f9d2bd5f” Name=”Modified” Hidden=”true” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”822c78e3-1ea9-4943-b449-57863ad33ca9″ Name=”Modified_x0020_By” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”8c06beca-0777-48f7-91c7-6da68bc07b69″ Name=”Created” Hidden=”true” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”4dd7e525-8d6b-4cb4-9d3e-44ee25f973eb” Name=”Created_x0020_By” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”82642ec8-ef9b-478f-acf9-31f7d45fbc31″ Name=”LinkTitle” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”7efc33c1-b56b-490e-9c9b-1097e971ba96″ Name=”ClientSideApplicationId” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”daef58d7-ccfd-43fc-b776-2e292cc66bba” Name=”PageLayoutType” />

<pnp:FieldRef ID=”c042a256-787d-4a6f-8a8a-cf6ab767f12d” Name=”ContentType” />

</pnp:FieldRefs>

<pnp:DocumentTemplate TargetName=”/_layouts/15/CreateSitePage.aspx” />

</pnp:ContentType>

The following three reasons gave me the clue to the fix which is to recreate the template to fix the issue with the PnP Provisioning process.

  1. The PnP provisioning suddenly stopped working
  2. The PnP Provisioning process was working fine on newly created source sites
  3. The schema of the OOTB “Repost Page” content type is changed and the field “Authors” no longer present in the new schema

To recreate the template you can take the help of ISVs like ShareGate, AvePoint, Metalogix etc. Thanks for reading.

About pgbhoyar

Prashant G Bhoyar is a Microsoft AI MVP and Microsoft Certified Professional. He currently works as a Senior Solution Architect at WithumSmith+Brown, P.C. (formerly Portal Solutions), one of the top 30 advisory and accounting firms in the United States. He is a trusted advisor and Subject Matter Expert in Intelligent Business Process Automation, development and post-implementation adoption of complex custom solutions in AI, Machine Learning, Bots, Azure, Office 365, and SharePoint. Prashant has supported a multitude of government agencies and non-profit organizations in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. Prashant is the co-author of the book “PowerShell for Office 365 “and is the technical reviewer of the book "Pro SharePoint 2013 Administration." He serves on the leadership committee for the Azure Data Fest conference, Artificial Intelligence Fest conference, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning User Group, DC Metro Office 365 User Group, SharePoint Saturday Baltimore event, and SharePoint Saturday Washington DC event. He is a renowned international speaker and actively speaks at technical conferences, most recently in India, Canada, England, Bangladesh, Peru , Washington DC, Austin, New York, Chicago, Seattle, New Orleans, Baltimore, Philadelphia. Fun fact??, Prashant is a recipient of the "Antarctic Service Medal of the United States of America" for his outstanding service in Antarctica.
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1 Response to PnP Provisioning Error: Field not found Issue with the Repost Page Content Type

  1. shalin (@shalinfriends84) says:
    August 9, 2019 at 7:35 am

    Hi Prashant,

    I’m getting the same issue while applying the custom template and creating the subsites based on the template. The sitecollection uses Repost Page and it does not have the column Authors under the content type, while the custom template which is used to create sub-sites does have Repost page content type with the column and it provide error saying “The field specified with name Authors and ID {746bb255-b0f7-47d5-9a3e-1c8e52468420} is not accessible or does not exist.
    “.. I cannot remove the OOTB content type and there is no way I can remove the column from the template as well. Can you please suggest the solution on how should I do these ?
    Thanks
    Shalin

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