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ERROR_APP_DATA_EXPIRED
Fast Cache data expired.
ERROR_APP_DATA_EXPIRED is Win32 error 4401 (0x1131) and belongs to Fast Cache freshness policy. The system description identifies the immediate condition but does not identify the caller, object, policy, device, service instance, or transition that produced it.
Interpret this result at the API boundary that returned it. Capture it before logging, cleanup, or another Windows call can replace the thread-local last-error value. Compare the recorded inputs with the documented precondition for Fast Cache freshness policy rather than starting with a broad system repair.
Where the result appears
- This result can surface during reading cached application data with an expiration time.
- This result can surface during offline startup after a long interval.
- It can surface during version or policy changes that invalidate old Fast Cache state.
- It can surface during a service deciding whether cached data may substitute for origin data.
Likely causes
- the entry age exceeded its allowed lifetime.
- a policy or application version shortened the validity window.
- system clock correction made the entry appear older.
- the producer intentionally invalidated data after an external change.
Diagnostic sequence
Diagnosis of it starts with the exact request type: read, write, create, transition, validation, cancellation, or administrative action. Identify the object generation and subsystem owner, then decide whether the failure happened before side effects, during a partial transition, or after completion. This ordering matters in Fast Cache freshness policy because a blind retry can hide stale state or repeat a non-idempotent change.
- record creation, last-update, and expiration timestamps.
- record system clock and time-service events.
- record application and schema versions.
- record effective cache lifetime policy.
- record availability and response of the authoritative source.
Correlate it with the owning component’s operational log, the Windows System log, and any subsystem trace. Telemetry for it should preserve native identifiers such as a path or file ID, handle generation, node or peer identity, policy ID, object version, offset and length, or transaction token. Retain decimal 4401, hexadecimal 0x1131, and the producing API even when a localized message is also shown.
State boundary to prove
The decisive boundary for it is whether the entry age exceeded its allowed lifetime. Prove or disprove that proposition using creation, last-update, and expiration timestamps together with system clock and time-service events. When observations for it disagree, preserve both and inspect the transition between them instead of choosing the more convenient value.
A focused validation for it should recreate the relevant part of this situation: a laptop returns from months offline with an intact cache entry. Its timestamp is beyond policy, so the application refreshes rather than trusting obsolete configuration. The negative case should keep the responsible condition unchanged and confirm error 4401; the recovery case should change only that condition and verify a successful result without an unrecorded side effect.
Handling, retry, and recovery
Refresh from the authoritative source and replace the entry atomically. Use stale data only when the application has an explicit, risk-aware stale-cache policy.
Retry it only after evidence shows a change in Fast Cache freshness policy. Initialization, asynchronous completion, recall, or service readiness can justify bounded backoff; malformed metadata, invalid identifiers, policy rejection, unsupported versions, and integrity failures require correction. Before repeating a write or configuration operation after it, query completion state explicitly.
What to log for support and telemetry
- log decimal 4401, hexadecimal
0x1131, and the producing API. - log the target object and observed Fast Cache freshness policy state.
- log caller identity, process and thread IDs, machine or node identity, and UTC time.
- log attempt number, elapsed time, previous result, and any partial side effect.
- retain the first lower-level or component-specific error before Win32 translation.
Difference from nearby codes
A validly parsed but old entry yields EXPIRED; malformed or failed integrity checks should yield CORRUPT.
Practical example
A laptop returns from months offline with an intact cache entry.
Developer and administrator guidance
Code that handles it should keep its Win32 domain visible across exceptions, RPC responses, and JSON or REST wrappers. Administrators should verify the subsystem evidence before changing policy, deleting state, forcing failover, or replacing storage. Recovery is demonstrated only when a test observes 4401, changes the responsible condition, and confirms that the same operation succeeds without hidden data loss.
References
- Microsoft: System Error Codes (4000–5999) — reference for error 4401.
- Microsoft: Storage management — reference for error 4401.
- Microsoft: Troubleshoot data corruption and disk errors — reference for error 4401.
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