Dec 19 2019 09:54 PM
Hi there everyone,
Sync was crashing for many users here. Any update from team on when Sync would be back to its functional state?
Thanks!
Dec 20 2019 12:16 AM
Dec 20 2019 12:29 AM
Thanks for the info. I read it earlier...
Sync is needed very badly because I need to access my data from other PCs or phone...
Dec 20 2019 12:37 AM
Dec 20 2019 12:19 PM
Dec 20 2019 01:54 PM
@Rohit Yadav @Dennis5mile @HotCakeX
Good news! We are slowly rolling favorites sync out to users in Dev. Please sign out and sign back in to the browser and let us know if you see any changes. This is enabled again in Canary, so if you don't see it in Dev, give it a shot there.
Fawkes (they/them)
Project & Community Manager - Microsoft Edge
Dec 20 2019 02:14 PM
Dec 21 2019 12:18 AM
@Deleted Thank you for the info. I enabled the master switch bc my browser was crashing even after the Favorites sync was disabled.
I would like to tell the team that the sync speed is very slow. I deleted my Mobile Favorites folder having over 200 favorites, but it has been hours & they haven't been cleared yet on my phone or other PCs.
Also, I noticed that the sync for Open Tabs is also not enabled now:
Any update on these issues?
Dec 21 2019 12:50 AM
Dec 21 2019 01:24 AM
@HotCakeX maybe the Open Tabs sync was the one responsible for crashing the browser? Because at that time when it was crashing for me, the Favorites sync was already turned off...
Dec 22 2019 05:54 AM - edited Dec 22 2019 01:15 PM
@HotCakeX "Beta should be still fine though ..."
Beta is not experiencing all of the problems Dev and Canary users have been experiencing, to be sure, because the last Beta build was released before Microsoft started to change/develop sync in Dev and Canary builds.
However, sync is not exactly "fine" in the Beta version, either. Favorites sync is either extremely slow (as @Rohit Yadav commented about other builds) or broken in the current Beta build, if my recent experience is indicative.
A few days ago, I took the time to prepare EdgeClassic Favorites for the January cutover, working to create a test environment for the cutover, so that I can see and understand exactly what will happen with the EdgeClassic to EdgeChromium cutover.
I am primarily interested in what will happen on a computer on which EdgeChromium has never been installed (because I maintain 20-odd computers in that state for a railroad museum where I volunteer), but I'm also curious about what will happen on computers on which EdgeChromium is installed.
I've read the available Microsoft information currently available on the cutover (intended, primarily, for Enterprise customers rather than consumers), but I know, from long experience in IT, that planned results often differ from actual results, so I decided to set up a test environment to anticipate the issues I'll face after the cutover.
In any event, I took the following steps:
EdgeClassic: I cleaned out most of the Favorites on my desktop computer, reducing the number of Favorites to 16 on the Favorites Bar and 11 in the Bookmarks Menu. I then changed the name of each Favorite/Bookmark to mark the origin as coming from EdgeClassic. "Forum" became "ForumE", for example. When I was done with that, I started up three laptops linked to my MSA, two of which had EdgeChromium Beta installed and one of which had never had EdgeChromium installed in any form. The three laptops synced correctly within minutes.
EdgeChromium: I repeated the steps I had taken with EdgeClassic (cleaned out most of the Favorites, set up the same 16/11 Favorites, and renamed, this time to "C" rather than "E", as in "ForumC"). When I was done with that, I started up the two laptops that had EdgeChromium installed (the laptop on which EdgeChromium had never been installed was irrelevant to this step, obviously).
What I found, to my surprise, was that the EdgeChromium two laptops did not sync quickly and accurately.
On the Favorites Bar, for example, some of the renamed Favorites showed up immediately, but others did not, and the results were inconsistent between the two laptops (e.g. "ForumC" replicated on all, but others like "AmzC" showed up on one but not the other, and others like "YmailC" did not show up at all).
Eventually, several hours and several browser restarts later, all of the favorites/bookmarks had correctly synced, but EdgeChromium sync is clearly not yet as quick or flawless as EdgeClassic sync.
More problematic, though, was EdgeChromium's sync behavior with respect to the deleted bookmarks from the "Other Favorites" menus. After 5-6 hours, some of those deleted bookmarks and folders had still not been removed from the laptop computers, and again the results were different on the two laptops. Sync would have eventually deleted all of the bookmarks, I assume, but I lost patience with the process at that point, and manually deleted the unremoved favorites on both laptops.
So something is not right with sync, even on the Beta build.
Based on these results and on the reports about myriad problems Dev and Canary users have been having with sync, I'm not confident that the EdgeClassic to EdgeChromium cutover is going to work either smoothly or flawlessly when the cutover happens in January.
I'll find out when it happens, I guess. The good news is that all of the computers at the railroad museum are Win10Pro, so I can block the cutover until I've tested and have a migration protocol worked out.
Dec 22 2019 07:25 AM
@tomscharbach appreciate the time you took to provide the explanation for the testing done by you.
I guess they still have a couple of things to fix to make the sync work for the current enabled items.
Let's hope the fix is made & shipped in all channels before the general availability of the browser so it doesn't makes a bad impression on the users.
Dec 22 2019 01:12 PM
Dec 22 2019 01:51 PM - edited Dec 22 2019 02:26 PM
@HotCakeX"I don't know how they are going to fix it 100% before the stable release time."
I don't, either, and that's why I'm not confident that the EdgeClassic to EdgeChromium cutover is going to work either smoothly or flawlessly when the cutover happens in January.
It has seemed to me while now that Microsoft is putting too much effort into bells and whistles that affect the 20% who are advanced users, and too little effort into basic functionality (like Favorites/Passwords sync) that affects the 80% of normal users.
I'm afraid that the ship will sink on launch unless Microsoft gets the basics right. The sync situation -- and the fact that several other basics aren't yet solved -- is very disappointing.
Dec 23 2019 04:13 AM