[SOLVED] ORA-12514 TNS:listener does not currently know of service requested in connect descriptor

ORA-12514 TNS:listener does not currently know of service requested in connect descriptor

We have an application running locally where we're experiencing the following error:

ORA-12514: TNS:listener does not currently know of service requested in connect descriptor

I've tested the connection using TNSPing which resolved correctly and I tried SQLPlus to try connecting, which failed with the same error as above. I used this syntax for SQLPlus:

sqlplus username/password@addressname[or host name]

We have verified that:

the TNS Listener on the server is running.
Oracle itself on the server is running.

We don't know of any changes that were made to this environment. Anything else we can test?

Solution

I had this issue and the fix was to make sure in tnsnames.ora the SERVICE_NAME is a valid service name in your database. To find out valid service names, you can use the following query in oracle:

select value from v$parameter where name='service_names'

Once I updated tnsnames.ora to:

TEST =
   (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS_LIST =
      (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = *<validhost>*)(PORT = *<validport>*))
    )
    (CONNECT_DATA =
      (SERVER = DEDICATED)
      (SERVICE_NAME = *<servicenamefromDB>*)
    )
)

then I ran:

sqlplus user@TEST

Success! The listener is basically telling you that whatever service_name you are using isn't a valid service according to the DB.

(*I was running sqlplus from Win7 client workstation to remote DB and blame the DBAs ;) *)