Understanding System Messages

All error, warning and informational messages that are displayed in the system are maintained on the message table. Every message is identified by a combination of two fields:

Message category number. Think of a message category as a library of messages related to a given functional area. For example, there is a message category for billing messages and another one for payment messages.
Message number. A unique number identifies each message within a category.

Every message has two components: a brief text message and a long description.

The brief message text supports the %n notation within the message text to cause field values to be substituted into a message. For example, the message text "Unable to assign To Do Entry (%1). It is already assigned to another User (%2)" will have the values of 2 fields merged into it before it is displayed to the user (%1 is the To Do Entry ID, %2 is the current assigned user).

Note: You cannot change the product’s text. If the message is "owned" by the product, you cannot change the product's message or detailed description. If you want your users to see a different message or detailed description other than that supplied by the product, enter your desired verbiage in the corresponding override fields (and flush the cache).