Data too long for column 'attribs' at row 1

francus641

Hello everyone,

I'm setting up a site locally (JA Trip J6 with Wampserver and Mariadb). When filling out the Tour info, I get the error in object when saving: Save failed with the following error: Data too long for column 'attribs' at row 1

I went into the database and in this table:

I doubled the value from 5120 to 10240.

After this change, I was able to save the pages properly.

Since I don't have your knowledge of databases or Joomla, I'm wondering if this database change could cause problems in the future.

The doubt also arises from reading this old post:

https://www.joomlart.com/forums/d/45522-save-failed-data-too-long-for-column-attribs-at-row-1/3

I see you say it's necessary to contact the host to resolve the issue.

Can you confirm that I acted correctly and that this database change won't affect the site's functionality?

Was there perhaps another way I should have gone about resolving the issue correctly?

Thanks in advance,

Best regards,

Francus

saguaros

Hi Francus,

This issue occurs because the imported content (custom fields) includes more data in the attribs field than the current column type can store. In the #__content table, attribs is defined as VARCHAR(5120), which has a maximum capacity of 5,120 characters. When the imported data exceeds that limit, MySQL rejects or truncates the value, causing the import to fail.

To resolve this, update the column type to LONGTEXT, which can store significantly larger JSON/serialized data. For example:

ALTER TABLE `#__content`
  MODIFY `attribs` LONGTEXT;

This will allow Joomla to store larger data structures without hitting the size limitation.

francus641

saguaros

Hi Heinz,

Thanks for your reply.

But let's say the change I described in the opening post is enough to save the page with the content I need, do you think that's a bad idea?

Is changing to longtext instead of doubling the characters while maintaining VARCHAR more secure?

That was my question, given that I can save the page with the change I described, is this a solution that could cause problems?

Thanks again

Francus