CiviCRM logging enabled. I am now getting an error on mysqldump. Unknown storage engine 'ARCHIVE'

Question

I getting the following error when I try to dump my civicrm drupal database

Couldn't read status information for table log_civicrm_install_canary () mysqldump: Couldn't execute 'show create table log_civicrm_install_canary': Unknown storage engine 'ARCHIVE' (1286)

This table is related to the civicrm logging feature as described in the article https://civicrm.org/blog/eileen/who-did-what-when. Logging was enabled a while ago and everything seemed to work fine. Since then the site has been migrated to a new host and has had both civi and the drupal core updated a number of times. Currently, The site is hosted on omega8 running barracuda which is an aeger based host so these updates are more like site migrations. The instructions in the blog required turning on INNODB with a civicrmapi call. This was run for the original site but not on any of the migrated sites. I don't know if this is relevant? I am now getting the error when dumping the database via mysqldump.

Does anyone have any idea what this table is for or what might be causing the error?

Thanks for any help.

Answer 1

Short answer: Change the storage engine of the table with the following command in mysql:

ALTER TABLE log_civicrm_install_canary ENGINE=InnoDB

The civicrm_install_canary is a table used for installation purposes. The purpose is explained in the answer on What is the installation canary?