We have a problem in our Magento shop when we try to set the position of the products in a category from manage categories. When we try to save a product after changing the posi
The error occurs most probably because you have the product position index set to auto and Magento tries to rebuild the index along with the product save.
Go to System->Index Management
and set the indexes related to catalog to 'manual'.
Then set the product positions and when you are done rebuild the indexes manually.