How to prevent Google Colab from disconnecting

Question

Q  Is there any way to programmatically prevent Google Colab from disconnecting on a timeout     The following describes the conditions causing a notebook to automatically disconnect      Google Colab notebooks have an idle timeout of 90 minutes and absolute timeout of 12 hours  This means  if user does not interact with his Google Colab notebook for more than 90 minutes  its instance is automatically terminated  Also  maximum lifetime of a Colab instance is 12 hours    Naturally  we want to automatically squeeze the maximum out of the instance  without having to manually interact with it constantly  Here I will assume commonly seen system requirements    Ubuntu 18 LTS   Windows 10   Mac Operating systems In case of Linux-based systems  using popular DEs like Gnome 3 or Unity Firefox or Chromium browsers   I should point out here that such behavior does not violate Google Colab s Terms of Use  although it is not encouraged according to their FAQ  in short  morally it is not okay to use up all of the GPUs if you don t really need it       My current solution is very dumb    First  I turn the screensaver off  so my sreen is always on  I have an Arduino board  so I just turned it into a rubber ducky usb and make it emulate primitive user interaction while I sleep  just because I have it at hand for other use-cases      Are there better ways

User · Answer

I was looking for a solution until I found a Python3 that randomly moves the mouse back and forth and clicks, always on the same place, but that's enough to fool Colab into thinking I'm active on the notebook and not disconnect.

import numpy as np
import time
import mouse
import threading

def move_mouse():
    while True:
        random_row = np.random.random_sample()*100
        random_col = np.random.random_sample()*10
        random_time = np.random.random_sample()*np.random.random_sample() * 100
        mouse.wheel(1000)
        mouse.wheel(-1000)
        mouse.move(random_row, random_col, absolute=False, duration=0.2)
        mouse.move(-random_row, -random_col, absolute=False, duration = 0.2)
        mouse.LEFT
        time.sleep(random_time)


x = threading.Thread(target=move_mouse)
x.start()

You need to install the needed packages: sudo -H pip3 install <package_name> You just need to run it (in your local machine) with sudo (as it takes control of the mouse) and it should work, allowing you to take full advantage of Colab's 12h sessions.

Credits: For those using Colab (Pro): Preventing Session from disconnecting due to inactivity

User · Answer

I use a Macro Program to periodically click on the RAM Disk button to train the model all night  The trick is to configure a macro program to click on the Ram Disk Colab Toolbar Button twice with a short interval between the two clicks so that even if the Runtime gets disconnected it will reconnect back   the first click used to close the dialog box and the second click used to RECONNECT   However  you still have to leave your laptop open all night and maybe pin the Colab tab

User · Answer

Well this is working for me -   run the following code in the console and it will prevent you from disconnecting  Ctrl  Shift   i to open inspector view   Then go to console   function ClickConnect        console log  Working         document querySelector  colab-toolbar-button connect   click      setInterval ClickConnect 60000    How to prevent google colab from disconnecting

User · Answer

Edit  Apparently the solution is very easy  and doesn t need any JavaScript  Just create a new cell at the bottom having the following line  while True pass  now keep the cell in the run sequence so that the infinite loop won t stop and thus keep your session alive  Old method  Set a javascript interval to click on the connect button every 60 seconds  Open developer-settings  in your web-browser  with Ctrl Shift I then click on console tab and type this on the console prompt   for mac press Option Command I  function ConnectButton        console log  quot Connect pushed quot         document querySelector  quot  top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button quot   shadowRoot querySelector  quot  connect quot   click      setInterval ConnectButton 60000

User · Answer

Instead of clicking the connect button  i just clicking on comment button to keep my session alive   August-2020  function ClickConnect     console log  quot Working quot     document querySelector  quot  comments  gt  span quot   click      setInterval ClickConnect 5000

User · Answer

Try this   function ClickConnect      console log  Working       document      querySelector   top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button        shadowRoot      querySelector   connect        click      setInterval ClickConnect 60000

User · Answer

You can also use Python to press the arrow keys  I added a little bit of randomness in the following code as well    from pyautogui import press  typewrite  hotkey import time from random import shuffle  array     left    right    up    down    while True      shuffle array      time sleep 10      press array 0       press array 1       press array 2       press array 3

User · Answer

Perhaps many of the previous solutions are no longer working  For example  this bellow code continues to create new code cells in Colab  working though  Undoubtedly  creating a bunch of code cells is an inconvenience  If too many code cells are created in some hours of running and there is no enough RAM  the browser may freeze  This repetedly creates code cells    function ClickConnect    console log  quot Working quot     document querySelector  quot colab-toolbar-button quot   click     setInterval ClickConnect 60000   But I found the code below is working  it doesn t cause any problems  In the Colab notebook tab  click on the Ctrl   Shift   i key simultaneously and paste the below code in the console  120000 intervals are enough  function ClickConnect    console log  quot Working quot     document querySelector  quot colab-toolbar-button connect quot   click     setInterval ClickConnect 120000   I have tested this code in firefox  in November 2020  It will work on chrome too

User · Answer

I tried the codes above but they did not work for me  So here is my JS code for reconnecting   let interval   setInterval function    let ok   document getElementById  ok    if ok    null      console log  Connect pushed    ok click       60000    You can use it with the same way  run it on the console of your browser  to run it  If you want to stop the script  you can enter clearInterval interval  and want to run again setInterval interval    I hope this helps you

User · Answer

I don t believe the JavaScript solutions work anymore  I was doing it from within my notebook with       from IPython display import display  HTML     js      lt script gt function ConnectButton                  console log  Connect pushed                  document querySelector   connect   click                  setInterval ConnectButton 3000   lt  script gt        display HTML js     When you first do a Run all  before the JavaScript or Python code has started   the console displays   Connected to  wss   colab research google com api kernels 0e1ce105-0127-4758-90e48cf801ce01a3 channels session id 5d8      However  ever time the JavaScript runs  you see the console log portion  but the click portion simply gives   Connect pushed  Uncaught TypeError  Cannot read property  click  of null  at ConnectButton   lt anonymous gt  1 92    Others suggested the button name has changed to  colab-connect-button  but that gives same error    After the runtime is started  the button is changed to show RAM DISK  and a drop down is presented  Clicking on the drop down creates a new  lt DIV class goog menu    gt  that was not shown in the DOM previously  with 2 options  Connect to hosted runtime  and  Connect to local runtime    If the console window is open and showing elements  you can see this DIV appear when you click the dropdown element  Simply moving the mouse focus between the two options in the new window that appears adds additional elements to the DOM  as soon as the mouse looses focus  they are removed from the DOM completely  even without clicking

User · Answer

GNU Colab lets you run a standard persistent desktop environment on top of a Colaboratory instance  Indeed it contains a mechanism to not let machines die of idling  Here s a video demonstration

User · Answer

I would recommend using JQuery  It seems that Co-lab includes JQuery by default     function ClickConnect      console log  Working         colab-toolbar-button   click      setInterval ClickConnect 60000

User · Answer

The most voted answer certainly works for me but it makes the Manage session window popping up again and again  I ve solved that by auto clicking the refresh button using browser console like below function ClickRefresh        console log  quot Clicked on refresh button quot         document querySelector  quot paper-icon-button quot   click     setInterval ClickRefresh  60000   Feel free to contribute more snippets for this at this gist https   gist github com Subangkar fd1ef276fd40dc374a7c80acc247613e

User · Answer

Well I am not a python guy nor I know what is the actual use of this  Colab   I use it as a build system lol  And I used to setup ssh forwarding in it then put this code and just leave it running and yeah it works  import getpass authtoken   getpass getpass

User · Answer

var startColabHandler   function startColabHandler interval   60000  enableConnectButton   false        console log  quot colabHandler - configure - start   quot    new Date              var colabClick   function colabClick             console log  quot colabHandler - click - start   quot    new Date                      if  enableConnectButton     true                var button1   document querySelector  quot  top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button quot   shadowRoot querySelector  quot  connect quot                             if  button1                    button1 click                                            button2   document querySelector  quot html body colab-dialog yes-no-dialog paper-dialog div buttons paper-button ok quot                     if  button2                button2 click                              console log  quot colabHandler - click - end   quot    new Date                 var intervalId   setInterval colabClick  interval        window stopColabHandler   function stopColabHandler             console log  quot colabHandler - stop - start   quot    new Date                      clearInterval intervalId                    console log  quot colabHandler - stop - start   quot    new Date                 console log  quot colabHandler - configure - end   quot    new Date

User · Answer

the following LATEST solution works for me  function ClickConnect      colab config   console log  quot Connnect Clicked - Start quot       document querySelector  quot  top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button quot   shadowRoot querySelector  quot  connect quot   click      console log  quot Connnect Clicked - End quot       setInterval ClickConnect  60000

User · Answer

I have a problem with these javascript functions   function ClickConnect        console log  Clicked on connect button         document querySelector  colab-connect-button   click     setInterval ClickConnect 60000    They print the  Clicked on connect button  on the console before the button is actually clicked  As you can see from different answers in this thread  the id of the connect button has changed a couple of times since Google Colab was launched  And it could be changed in the future as well  So if you re going to copy an old answer from this thread it may say  Clicked on connect button  but it may actually not do that  Of course if the clicking won t work it will print an error on the console but what if you may not accidentally see it  So you better do this   function ClickConnect        document querySelector  colab-connect-button   click       console log  Clicked on connect button       setInterval ClickConnect 60000    And you ll definitely see if it truly works or not

User · Answer

For me the following examples    document querySelector   connect   click   or document querySelector  colab-toolbar-button connect   click   or document querySelector  colab-connect-button   click      were throwing errors    I had to adapt them to the following   Version 1   function ClickConnect      console log  Connnect Clicked - Start       document querySelector   top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button   shadowRoot querySelector   connect   click      console log  Connnect Clicked - End        setInterval ClickConnect  60000    Version 2  If you would like to be able to stop the function  here is the new code   var startClickConnect   function startClickConnect        var clickConnect   function clickConnect            console log  Connnect Clicked - Start            document querySelector   top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button   shadowRoot querySelector   connect   click            console log  Connnect Clicked - End                 var intervalId   setInterval clickConnect  60000        var stopClickConnectHandler   function stopClickConnect             console log  Connnect Clicked Stopped - Start            clearInterval intervalId           console log  Connnect Clicked Stopped - End                return stopClickConnectHandler      var stopClickConnect   startClickConnect      In order to stop  call   stopClickConnect

User · Answer

create a python code in your pc with pynput  from pynput mouse import Button  Controller import time  mouse   Controller    while True      mouse click Button left  1      time sleep 30    Run this code in your Desktop  Then point mouse arrow over  colabs left panel - file section  directory structure on any directory this code will keep clicking on directory on every 30 seconds so it will  expand and shrink every 30 seconds  so your session will not get expired Important - you have to run this code in your pc

User · Answer

Updated one  it works for me   x000D   x000D  function ClickConnect    console log  Working     document querySelector  paper-icon-button   click     Const myjob   setInterval ClickConnect  60000  x000D   x000D   x000D   If isn t working you for you guys try clear it by running   x000D   x000D  clearInterval myjob  x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

The javascript below works for me  Credits to  artur k space  function ColabReconnect         var dialog   document querySelector  quot colab-dialog yes-no-dialog quot        var dialogTitle   dialog  amp  amp  dialog querySelector  quot div content-area gt h2 quot        if  dialogTitle  amp  amp  dialogTitle innerText     quot Runtime disconnected quot             dialog querySelector  quot paper-button ok quot   click            console log  quot Reconnecting    quot          else           console log  quot ColabReconnect is in service  quot            timerId   setInterval ColabReconnect  60000    In the Colab notebook  click on Ctrl   Shift   the i key simultaneously  Copy and paste the script into the prompt line  Then hit Enter before closing the editor  By doing so  the function will check every 60 seconds to see if the onscreen connection dialog is shown  and if it is  the function would then click the ok button automatically for you

User · Answer

This one worked for me  it seems like they changed the button classname or id       x000D   x000D  function ClickConnect    x000D      console log  Working     x000D      document querySelector  colab-connect-button   click    x000D    x000D  setInterval ClickConnect 60000  x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

Since the id of the connect button is now changed to  colab-connect-button   the following code can be used to keep clicking on the button   function ClickConnect        console log  Clicked on connect button         document querySelector  colab-connect-button   click     setInterval ClickConnect 60000       If still  this doesn t work  then follow the steps given below     Right-click on the connect button  on the top-right side of the colab  Click on inspect Get the HTML id of the button and substitute in the following code   function ClickConnect        console log  Clicked on connect button         document querySelector  Put ID here   click      Change id here   setInterval ClickConnect 60000

User · Answer

function ClickConnect        console log  Clicked on connect button         document querySelector  connect   click      Change id here   setInterval ClickConnect 60000    Try above code it worked for me

User · Answer

Using python selenium  from selenium webdriver common keys import Keys from selenium import webdriver import time     driver   webdriver Chrome   usr lib chromium-browser chromedriver    notebook url      driver get notebook url     run all cells driver find element by tag name  body   send keys Keys CONTROL   Keys F9  time sleep 5     click to stay connected start time   time time   current time   time time   max time   11 59 60  12hours  while  current time - start time   lt  max time      webdriver ActionChains driver  send keys Keys ESCAPE  perform       driver find element by xpath       id  top-toolbar   colab-connect-button   click       time sleep 30      current time   time time

User · Answer

The above answers with the help of some scripts maybe work well  I have a solution or a kind of trick  for that annoying disconnection without scripts  especially when your program must read data from your google drive  like training a deep learning network model  where using scripts to do reconnect operation is of no use because once you disconnect with your colab  the program is just dead  you should manually connect to your google drive again to make your model able to read dataset again  but the scripts will not do that thing  I ve already test it many times and it works well  When you run a program on the colab page with a browser I use Chrome   just remember that don t do any operation to your browser once your program starts running  like  switch to other webpages  open or close another webpage  and so on  just just leave it alone there and waiting for your program finish running  you can switch to another software  like pycharm to keep writing your codes but not switch to another webpage  I don t know why open or close or switch to other pages will cause the connection problem of the google colab page  but each time I try to bothered my browser  like do some search job  my connection to colab will soon break down

User · Answer

Try this to avoid all the annoying dialog boxes appearing while you work when trying to simulate the click on the toolbar connect button every minute  you can just copy paste this to your console  call the method and you can work on your notebook  function connectRefresher            window ConnectButtonIntervalId   setInterval function ConnectButton                    console log  quot connected quot                     document querySelector  quot  top-toolbar  gt  colab-connect-button quot   shadowRoot querySelector  quot  connect quot   click                    document querySelector  quot colab-sessions-dialog quot   shadowRoot querySelector  quot  footer  gt  div  gt  paper-button quot   click                    console log  quot closed the dialog   quot                   60000              function clearRefresher                 console log  quot clear Interval called    quot               clearInterval window ConnectButtonIntervalId           connectRefresher      to connect the refresher  clearRefresher      to disconnect the refresher

User · Answer

Just run the code below after the cell you want to run to save from data loss   python  Also to exit from this mode  write exit

User · Answer

function ClickConnect         console log  quot Working     quot         document querySelector  quot paper-button comments quot   click     setInterval ClickConnect 600   this worked for me but use wisely happy learning

User · Answer

This code keep clicking  quot Refresh folder quot  in the file explorer pane  function ClickRefresh      console log  quot Working quot       document querySelector  quot  icon  colab folder-refresh   quot   click     const myjob   setInterval ClickRefresh  60000

[python] How to prevent Google Colab from disconnecting?

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