ORA-02019: connection description for remote database not found

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ORA-02019: connection description for remote database not found

This error can be seen when you specify a nonexistent or mistyped database link name or when invoking a synonym that points to an object containing a nonexistent database link.

As the former case is trivial, let's look at the latter:

say you have a db link called remote_db:

CREATE SYNONYM remote_table_a FOR table_a@remote_db;

then at a later time you drop the db link (supposing the connection closed, otherwise you'll get ORA-02018):

DROP DATABASE LINK remote_db;

now, when you attempt to run a query on remote_table_a, you get:

ORA-02019: connection description for remote database not found

Clearly, if you don't know that behind the synonym there is a db link, this error can be puzzling, especially if the synonym is public and the underlying definition has not been created by you...

See message translations for ORA-02019, ORA-02018 and search additional resources.