Room362.com

Blatherings of a security addict.

Google Docs Bug

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 So, instead of doing this the right way, which is submitting a bug report to google, I am going to do this the blogger way:

  1. Publish article to blog about problem in product

    • Wait for traffic to rise on blog

    • Become giddy at rise in traffic due to outstanding title

    • Watch as traffic falls within days

    • Become angry and write retort (in said blog, still not contacting the company) getting mad about the STILL unfixed problem

Actually thats a lie, here is what I reported to Google after I wrote the above statement:

This problem only happens in a specific sequence of events, but can be easily reproduced.

  1. User 1 opens Google Doc that is collaboratively edited.

    • User 1 closes browser (with save session ability)

    • User 2 opens Google Doc and makes an edit to that same document

    • User 2 saves the new edits (through AutoSave or save/close or save)

    • User 1 at any point after this save (User 2 doesn’t have to have the document closed), opens his saved session browser and it opens the old version of the doc. If user 1 then waits long enough for AutoSave to do its thing or save/closes it, then the document is saved in its old status.

This can easily be fixed by reverting via revision history to the “newer” version, but also can easily go unnoticed. A suggestion for a fix would be a nice popup on User 1’s screen saying that there is a newer version of that document available.

If you have a fix, please leave a comment. I would really hate to find out that this is a simple preferences setting.

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