Symptoms

Confluence 5 sidebar does not display. 

The following appears in the atlassian-confluence.log:

ERROR [http-8080-2] [mywork.host.rest.ExceptionLogger] toResponse Exception thrown from resource
 -- url: /rest/mywork/latest/status/notification/count | userName: bimmel | referer: 
http://localhost:8090/confluence/plugins/servlet/stp/view/
com.atlassian.activeobjects.internal.ActiveObjectsSqlException: There was a SQL exception thrown 
by the Active Objects library:

java.sql.SQLSyntaxErrorException: ORA-01031: insufficient privileges  

Diagnosis

Oracle database is in use in this specific example. Could be applied to other database types. The ORA-01031 is caused when an attempt was made to change the current username or password without the appropriate privilege. This error also occurs if attempting to install a database without the necessary operating system privileges. When Trusted Oracle is configure in DBMS MAC, this error may occur if the user was granted the necessary privilege at a higher level than the current login. 

Action: Ask the database administrator to perform the operation or grant the required privileges. For Trusted Oracle users getting this error although granted the appropriate privilege at a higher level, ask the database administrator to re-grant the privilege at the appropriate level.

Checking the developer console shows:

Uncaught TypeError: undefined is not a function
(function(A){Confluence.Sidebar.LinkAdapter={setLink:function(D){var C=AJS.Meta.get("context-path");

Cause

The database user account does not have the proper privileges granted to interact with the database. 

Resolution

• Refer to Confluence documentation for Database Configuration for your specific database

• Ensure the proper privileges have been granted to the database user to access the Confluence database