# Error : Cannot describe \<table\>. It has 0 columns

**URL:** <https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007>\
**Category:** Uncategorized\
**Created:** [August 9, 2017, 9:07pm UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007 "2017-08-09T21:07:35Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 7\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![subhasree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecb155/32.png) [@subhasree](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/subhasree)\
**Post date:** [August 9, 2017, 9:07pm UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/1 "2017-08-09T21:07:35Z")

</div>

Hi,  
I have just started learning cakephp and I am a complete beginner. I have setup the cakephp application and app.php I have run this **c:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\>bin\cake bake all users** to bake the users from bake console and it was done successfully. Now when i go to the url [http://localhost/bookmarks/users/](http://localhost/bookmarks/users/) I am getting the below erors.  
Cannot describe users. It has 0 columns.

⟩ Cake\Database\Schema\Collection-\>describe CORE\src\Database\Schema\CachedCollection.php, line 63  
⟩ Cake\Database\Schema\CachedCollection-\>describe CORE\src\ORM\Table.php, line 531  
⟩ Cake\ORM\Table-\>getSchema CORE\src\ORM\Query.php, line 210  
⟩ Cake\ORM\Query-\>addDefaultTypes CORE\src\ORM\Query.php, line 167  
⟩ Cake\ORM\Query-\>\_\_construct CORE\src\ORM\Table.php, line 1569

Please help me out to remove this database describe error.

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**Author:** ![syed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@syed](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/syed)\
**Post date:** [August 10, 2017, 3:54am UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/2 "2017-08-10T03:54:26Z")

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Have you checked your user table in your database? Does it have any columns?

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**Author:** ![subhasree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecb155/32.png) [@subhasree](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/subhasree)\
**Post date:** [August 10, 2017, 5:42am UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/3 "2017-08-10T05:42:04Z")

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Yes, I have checked in the users table. There are four rows in the table.  
What does this, it has 0 columns error mean.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![subhasree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecb155/32.png) [@subhasree](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/subhasree)\
**Post date:** [August 10, 2017, 6:20am UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/4 "2017-08-10T06:20:27Z")

</div>

The detail error log is as below:

[Cake\Database\Exception] Cannot describe users. It has 0 columns. Request URL: /users Stack Trace: #0 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Database\Schema\CachedCollection.php(63): Cake\Database\Schema\Collection-\>describe(‘users’, Array) #1 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\ORM\Table.php(531): Cake\Database\Schema\CachedCollection-\>describe(‘users’) #2 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\ORM\Query.php(210): Cake\ORM\Table-\>getSchema() #3 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\ORM\Query.php(167): Cake\ORM\Query-\>addDefaultTypes(Object(App\Model\Table\UsersTable)) #4 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\ORM\Table.php(1569): Cake\ORM\Query-\>\_\_construct(Object(Cake\Database\Connection), Object(App\Model\Table\UsersTable)) #5 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\ORM\Table.php(1171): Cake\ORM\Table-\>query() #6 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Controller\Component\PaginatorComponent.php(185): Cake\ORM\Table-\>find(‘all’, Array) #7 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Controller\Controller.php(717): Cake\Controller\Component\PaginatorComponent-\>paginate(Object(App\Model\Table\UsersTable), Array) #8 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\src\Controller\UsersController.php(23): Cake\Controller\Controller-\>paginate(Object(App\Model\Table\UsersTable)) #9 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Controller\Controller.php(440): App\Controller\UsersController-\>index() #10 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\ActionDispatcher.php(119): Cake\Controller\Controller-\>invokeAction() #11 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\ActionDispatcher.php(93): Cake\Http\ActionDispatcher-\>\_invoke(Object(App\Controller\UsersController)) #12 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\BaseApplication.php(78): Cake\Http\ActionDispatcher-\>dispatch(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #13 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Runner.php(65): Cake\Http\BaseApplication-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response), Object(Cake\Http\Runner)) #14 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Routing\Middleware\RoutingMiddleware.php(59): Cake\Http\Runner-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #15 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Runner.php(65): Cake\Routing\Middleware\RoutingMiddleware-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response), Object(Cake\Http\Runner)) #16 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Routing\Middleware\AssetMiddleware.php(88): Cake\Http\Runner-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #17 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Runner.php(65): Cake\Routing\Middleware\AssetMiddleware-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response), Object(Cake\Http\Runner)) #18 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Error\Middleware\ErrorHandlerMiddleware.php(92): Cake\Http\Runner-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #19 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Runner.php(65): Cake\Error\Middleware\ErrorHandlerMiddleware-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response), Object(Cake\Http\Runner)) #20 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\debug\_kit\src\Middleware\DebugKitMiddleware.php(52): Cake\Http\Runner-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #21 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Runner.php(65): DebugKit\Middleware\DebugKitMiddleware-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response), Object(Cake\Http\Runner)) #22 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Runner.php(51): Cake\Http\Runner-\>\_\_invoke(Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #23 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\vendor\cakephp\cakephp\src\Http\Server.php(80): Cake\Http\Runner-\>run(Object(Cake\Http\MiddlewareQueue), Object(Cake\Http\ServerRequest), Object(Cake\Http\Response)) #24 C:\xampp\htdocs\bookmarks\webroot\index.php(37): Cake\Http\Server-\>run() #25 {main}

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![syed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@syed](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/syed)\
**Post date:** [August 10, 2017, 7:37am UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/5 "2017-08-10T07:37:07Z")

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Did you create the database table yourself? If so Have you defined id as primary key?

Also, navigate to _src/Model/Table_ you wil see a file named UsersTable.php copy paste the **validationDefault** _function_ code here.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dmuenstermann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9bd4f/32.png) [@dmuenstermann](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/dmuenstermann)\
**Post date:** [August 11, 2017, 3:00pm UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/6 "2017-08-11T15:00:33Z")

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does the table user **s** really exist? Or is it possible that you missed the ‘s’ at the end? =)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Hitman1O1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hitman1O1](https://discourse.cakephp.org/u/Hitman1O1)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2020, 1:48pm UTC](https://discourse.cakephp.org/t/error-cannot-describe-table-it-has-0-columns/3007/7 "2020-01-06T13:48:45Z")

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Old question but still number one through search engine. so I’ll add to it.

Had the same problem, turned out to be because of the owner of the table was different from the user I was using: [https://github.com/cakephp/cakephp/issues/10450](https://github.com/cakephp/cakephp/issues/10450)