When saving a site as a template, an error such as the one below may be displayed. Viewing the ULS logs isn’t much help as it displays similar error information and also a NullReferenceException. I had a similar error with a custom list and deleting all of its items resolved the error. Since I was not saving data (Include Content checked), I knew that it wasn’t necessarily a data issue. The root cause ended up being view throttling. For some reason, the view throttles for a regular user were preventing large lists from being exported. This error can be worked around by temporarily increasing the web application’s list view throttles.
Error exporting the list named "User Information List" at the URL: _catalogs/users
Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code.Exception Details: Microsoft.SharePoint.SPException: Error exporting the list named "User Information List" at the URL: _catalogs/users
Source Error:
An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below.
Stack Trace:
[SPException: Error exporting the list named "User Information List" at the URL: _catalogs/users] Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSolutionExporter.ExportLists() +27271840 Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSolutionExporter.GenerateSolutionFiles() +511 Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSolutionExporter.ExportWebAsSolution() +27287522 Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSolutionExporter.ExportWebToGallery(SPWeb web, String solutionFileName, String title, String description, ExportMode exportMode, Boolean includeContent, String workflowTemplateName, String destinationListUrl) +1789 Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSolutionExporter.ExportWebToGallery(SPWeb web, String solutionFileName, String title, String description, ExportMode exportMode, Boolean includeContent) +44 Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationPages.SaveAsTemplatePage.BtnSaveAsTemplate_Click(Object sender, EventArgs e) +331 System.Web.UI.WebControls.Button.OnClick(EventArgs e) +115 System.Web.UI.WebControls.Button.RaisePostBackEvent(String eventArgument) +140 System.Web.UI.Page.RaisePostBackEvent(IPostBackEventHandler sourceControl, String eventArgument) +29 System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint) +2981
Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:2.0.50727.5466; ASP.NET Version:2.0.50727.5456