Symptoms
Consider the following scenario:
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You have Microsoft SQL Server Data Tools - Business Intelligence for Visual Studio 2013 (SSDT-BI) version 12.0.2299.1 and Microsoft SQL Server 2014 installed side by side.
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You have Microsoft SQL Server 2014 Cumulative Update 4 (CU4) installed afterward.
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You use SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) to connect to the database engine.
In this scenario, you receive the following error message from SSMS:
The type initializer for 'PropertyMetadataProvider' threw an exception. (Microsoft.SqlServer.Smo)
Additional information: Could not load type 'Microsoft.SqlServer.Management.Smo.DefaultDistributionPolicy' from assembly 'Microsoft.SqlServer.SqlEnum, Version=12.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=89845dcd8080cc91'. (Microsoft.SqlServer.Smo)Resolution
Cumulative Update information
The issue was first fixed in the following cumulative update of SQL Server.
Each new cumulative update for SQL Server contains all the hotfixes and all the security fixes that were included with the previous cumulative update. We recommend that you download and install the latest cumulative updates for SQL Server:
Status
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.