Zotero stuck in endless updating loop

tamodeo
Hello--I've been working on the citations for a proposal for 3 days now within Google Docs. Today--when I go into add any citations, it gets stuck in an endless updating loop in Google Docs. It goes through the whole document and then starts again. I have to close the tab to interrupt it. I've let it go for 45 minutes and that did not help. Now I'm stuck and cannot finish my proposal.

Any help would be much appreciated! Thank you.
  • dstillman
    edited July 28, 2020
    How are you determining that it's starting again?

    Have you tried restarting Zotero and your browser?

    If you can reproduce this after restarting those things, can you provide Debug IDs from Zotero and the Zotero Connector for a couple loops?
  • tamodeo
    Hello--thanks so much for your kind response. What happened was that when I would add a citation, it would start scanning the document. It went on and on. When it would reach the bottom--it would start again. I tried a few things before reverting back to the morning's version of the document. I lost a half-day's work--but it was working again. Very frustrating! Thanks anyway for your help!
  • dstillman
    If you can make a copy of the document and reproduce it using an earlier version of the document from version history, we'd still want to see Debug IDs for it so that we could figure out what was happening and fix it.
  • tamodeo
    I can try that if you let me know where to find the Debug information. Once it gets in that loop, I can only interrupt it by closing the tab.
  • dstillman
    I linked to instructions above.
  • tamodeo
    I have a historical copy that should generate the error. Before I do that, are we confident that this will NOT affect my main document--which has the same citations/notes as my copy document? The document is at the submission stage and I could land myself in some hot water if something gets messed up with the references page.
  • dstillman
    Yes, the Zotero citations in the copy of a document have no connection to the original.
  • tamodeo
    OK here it is while in endless loop mode --> D1811273580
  • dstillman
    I'm not seeing an endless loop here — there's an 80-second delay with no activity before you submitted this. Are you interpreting a spinning progress bar as an endless loop? Because that wouldn't be the case. If you're seeing a progress bar with no seeming progress, it's likely that there's a window behind your other windows. Try cycling through your Zotero or browser windows to see if there's a prompt waiting for your input.
  • matti.tj.heino
    Hi, I believe I'm experiencing the same problem. See Debug ID: D645110854.

    What happens is: I try to add or change an in-text citation, and get a message box on screen; "Zotero is updating your document". Behind the box, the blurred out document scrolls slowly downwards, and it looks like it uses the search function in some way; there's a search box on the top-right corner which says e.g. "2898 of 4200". The first number keeps increasing until it reaches 4200, at which point my document shown in the background is at its end, and starts from the beginning (counter loops to zero). This never stops, that is, it goes smoothly past the original position (2898 of 4200) where I tried to insert the citation.

    Would love to post screencaps but can't do here.

    Curiously, after struggling with this repeatedly for hours (force-closing Zotero to stop the process and get back to writing), when I was recording the debug thing, it suddenly asked "Updating is taking a long time, would you like to turn auto-update off?". I answered no, and everything returned to normal.
  • adomasven
    If you see this again make a copy of the document and try step 11 of Troubleshooting Errors in Word Processor Documents instructions to find a part of the document that reproduces this broken behavior.

    Zotero is forced to use the Google Docs search functionality for some rare behavior, although usually it should search over not more than 50 pieces of information unless there's a lot of duplication in your document. At the end of that process, if successful, you should get a prompt from Zotero, usually about a citation that has been manually edited.
  • rudiger8
    I have the same problem as described by tamodeo on July 27, 2020
    Is there a solution?
Sign In or Register to comment.