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Okay, this is messed up. I opened up my budgets spreadsheet as I do every week, and realized that I could only edit 1-2 cells before everything would freeze up. Inspecting the UI, I found a tiny lightning bolt in a circle next to the title whose hover text reads "You are offline". No Google, I'm not. This is in Chrome, which appears to have updated itself today.

I uninstalled the Google Drive desktop program (had been meaning to anyway after reading this scary article) and also removed Google Drive from the list of apps on my new tab screen. No luck.

Other details:

  • It seems to apply to other spreadsheets too, but not text documents.
  • It seems to work fine in Firefox
  • Chrome is version 22.0.1229.94
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3
  • I don't have a solution, but I've seen the same thing. Obviously the "heartbeat" being sent back to the Google servers isn't returning (on time) and so the client drops into offline mode. I've not been able to find a consistent time, place, or circumstance for when this happens.
    – ale
    Commented Oct 24, 2012 at 12:53
  • 1
    I just experienced this not too long ago with the Drive client itself. Here, I opened the Dev console and can see that a DNS lookup is failing. I think there's a bug related to the "0." hostname. I've seen this before and the following fixed it then and now: From: superuser.com/questions/203674/how-to-clear-flush-the-dns-cache-in-google-chrome "Navigate to chrome://net-internals/#dns and press the "Clear host cache" button."
    – rainabba
    Commented Jul 23, 2014 at 21:12
  • I am hitting this when I try to edit a lot of documents at once. I'm trying to migrate a few hundred documents so I'm opening up 20-30 docs at once, pasting content into each, etc... only to have it start having these issues!
    – Michael
    Commented Apr 24, 2018 at 17:53

15 Answers 15

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6

I had this same problem for about a month.

Today I had the idea to disable the image blocker extension that I had installed for Chrome. Drive started working again immediately. I wish I had realized this earlier!

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1
  • I disabled all extensions and the problem disappeared. Thanks for the suggestion!
    – qris
    Commented Aug 27, 2016 at 17:03
3

I found it beneficial to investigate whether or not the computer's security software is a factor. For me, Kaspersky automatically updated in such a way that inhibited my ability to edit in Google Docs. It was the result of an 'encrypted connection scanning' issue.

This site was helpful: http://www.htgsd.com/information-technology/google/google-drive-trying-to-connect-to-edit-offline-turn-on-offline-sync-when-you-reconnect/

I'm wondering if others might experience a similar problem even with different software. I hope everyone finds their remedy.

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1
  • Thank you! I saw that requests to 0.docs.google.com were failing with no reason in Chrome. I tried whitelisting it in adblock, but it wasn't until I disabled Encrypted Connection Scanning in Kaspersky that it came right.
    – Wogan
    Commented Nov 28, 2015 at 21:01
2

It just happened to me and turned out to be script blocking.

If you are using ScriptSafe or any of the other script blocker - make sure scripts originating from 0.docs.google.com (and possibly others, as the implementation changes with time) are marked "allowed".

Needless to say - make sure the scripts you allow are safe before you allow them...

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1
  • Interesting. I don't use any kind of script blocking, so it must have been something else causing it for me...
    – MalcolmOcean
    Commented Mar 14, 2013 at 4:34
1

It seeeeems that this is no longer an issue thanks to some update to something. Fingers crossed.

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1

I had this problem with Firefox.

I did this: Tools → options → security

I had Warn me when sites try to install add ons checked.

I added an exception for 0.docs.google.com and now it seems to be working ok (for now).

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1

Had the same problem, found the solution here : https://support.google.com/drive/thread/9501291?hl=en&msgid=21314289

It's this little switch that caused the whole "Offline" problem (in the parameters of Google Docs here but can be in any Google app) : switch offline parameeters Google Docs, Sheets, etc.

It was on, an the moment I switched it off, everything came back.

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1

I had had the same issue but I resolved it.

My steps are:

  1. Clear cookies
  2. Turn off Ad-block plus
  3. Refresh the page

It worked for me. Hope it helps.

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1

I had a pop up blocker that was causing the problem. Disabling it made the files in Google Drive available again. It's never done that before, but clicking disable on this site fixed it.

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0

This is probably Google Docs/Drive's issue. I have the same issue and have tried turning off the offline editing but no luck. Since the offline mode is only supported by Chrome for now according to Google support doc, the easiest walk around is to use IE/Firefox/Safari.

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0

If you have another device like an iPad or 2nd computer, try using the Docs app and make some kind of change to the document. For whatever reason, it resolved my problem. I just went into the document on my iPad, pressed the spacebar, checked on my computer, and I was back online.

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0

Try making a copy of your spreadsheet. If you have other spreadsheets linked to your original spreadsheet, you can use a utility such as https://www.ignaciobaixauli.com/aplicaciones/aplicaciones-con-google-apps-script/replaza-textos-en-google-spreadsheets to change references to your original spreadsheet

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0

I had AdBlock Plus and AdBlocker Ultimate. When on, the document said I was offline. When off, it said I was online. I think ad blockers play a role.

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0

If you're using Chrome, try clearing out any temporary files associated with Drive. You will lose any unsynced changes via this method.

Steps:

  1. With a Doc site open, press "Ctrl + Shift + j or i or F12" (MacOS: "⌘ + Option + i"). The "Developer Tools"/"DevTools" window should pop-up.
  2. Navigate to the "Application" tab at the top.
  3. Underneath "Application" in the left-hand panel, select "Clear storage".
  4. In the primary panel on the right-hand side, click the button at the bottom labelled "Clear site data".

Note: This method should work with any browser, but I have only tested in Chrome. If you're stuck in a sync error loop, try opening your Doc/Sheet in an Incognito tab, and duplicating and then deleting the Page/Sheet you believe may be responsible for the sync error.

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0

i also had same problem but after disable my avira web security google drive working normal again

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-1

Check that Google Sync is working properly. Or any messages in Google Sync.

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