The process could not execute ‘sp_replcmds’ on …

When setting up SQL Server replication you might see an error message from the Transactional Replication Log Reader Agent which reads like the following.

Error messages:

• The process could not execute ‘sp_replcmds’ on ”. (Source: MSSQL_REPL, Error number: MSSQL_REPL20011)
  Get help: http://help/MSSQL_REPL20011
• Cannot execute as the database principal because the principal “dbo” does not exist, this type of principal cannot be impersonated, or you do not have permission. (Source: MSSQLServer, Error number: 15517)
  Get help: http://help/15517
• The process could not execute ‘sp_replcmds’ on ”. (Source: MSSQL_REPL, Error number: MSSQL_REPL22037)
  Get help: http://help/MSSQL_REPL22037

Often this error message can come from the database not having a valid owner, or the SQL Server is not being able to correctly identify the owner of the database. Often this is easiest to fix by changing the database owner by using the sp_changedbowner system stored procedure as shown below. The sa account is a reliable account to use to change the ownership of the database to.

USE PublishedDatabase
GO
EXEC sp_changedbowner 'sa'
GO

Once the database ownership has been changed the log reader will probably start working right away. If it doesn’t quickly restarting the log reader should resolve the problem.

While this does require changes to the production database, there is no outage required to make these changes.

Denny