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Best answer

Google Sheets Timed Out

  • 18 November 2020
  • 5 replies
  • 1265 views
M
Userlevel 1

I am using a zap that adds and edits new rows to my google spreadsheet. It runs once a day, and grabs data from social media posts.

I started getting this error daily:

“Google Sheets: The read operation timed out. This usually happens because your spreadsheet is too big. Consider starting a new spreadsheet with less data. Or, consider turning OFF any Zaps that use this spreadsheet, delete any unnecessary rows or columns from the spreadsheet, then turn the affected Zaps back ON.”

To make the sheet size as small as possible, I made a new spreadsheet file and only imported data absolutely necessary and deleted extra rows/columns

It currently has 5 columns and about 5,000 rows, and I am already getting the same error again. (only a coulple days worth of data, I need to store atleast a month worth of data, preferably more) Surely there has to be a way around this, 5000 rows is not even that significant of a number. Is there a defined limit?

 

Please let me know if there is any work arounds

icon

Best answer by mindbiz 18 November 2020, 22:59

View original
This post has been closed for comments. Please create a new post if you need help or have a question about this topic.

5 replies

Troy Tessalone
Userlevel 7
Badge +14

Article: https://zapier.com/help/doc/common-problems-google-sheets-zapier#sslerror-the-read-operation-timed-out

 

⚡ Troy Tessalone - AutomationAce.com | Premier Certified Zapier Expert | #1 Zapier Community Contributor
M
Userlevel 1

Thank you for your response, I looked into the article.

I need the data to be eventually imported into google sheets because that is where I have everything set up in. That being said I tried to import that data into an airtable database, which I’d sync with a spreadsheet. Then I came across a new problem, I don’t believe zapier has an integration that allows multiple airtable records to be created at once. I need a couple hundred new records to be created at once. Rather than doing that, it seems the API will only allow one new record to be created (which then the couple hundred rows are all combined into a single cell, with data separated by commas).

 

How can I set up airtable so that the data is imported correctly in there? MySQL seems more complicated and expensive than what I need.

Troy Tessalone
Userlevel 7
Badge +14

Zapier in most cases really isn't meant to do bulk actions of 100s of records, rather 1 record at a time.

Otherwise, you’d have to create a looping/iterating Zap.

⚡ Troy Tessalone - AutomationAce.com | Premier Certified Zapier Expert | #1 Zapier Community Contributor
M
Userlevel 1

Zapier in most cases really isn't meant to do bulk actions of 100s of records, rather 1 record at a time.

Otherwise, you’d have to create a looping/iterating Zap.

Sounds like a shortcoming of zapier/airtable integration. In google sheets you are able to add/edit multiple rows in a single zap. I will figure out an alternate solution

M
Userlevel 1

Issue fixed

Ended up fixing by having the data be combined into a single row then imported into a google sheet with a delimiter to separate values. That way the sheet that needs to be accessed by the API is tiny, then I imported data from that into a larger spreadsheet where I used a bunch of functions to separate out all the values and put them back in the correct place.

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