OneNote does not sync

I feel happy to login and find everything back to normal. What a relief. I see everyone else's is working again too. That's great. I did some more research into OneNote and the news to see if perhaps they would announce the bug and give an estimated time when it would be fixed, or at least confirmation it was being acknowledged and worked on. 

What I found instead was, OneNote made some major changes to their services to improve them and make them better. (This could have been the result of that) And Evernote recently announced a major increase to their membership fees and as a result everyone is jumping ship and coming to OneNote by the hundreds, probably thousands as I type this. 

Who knows what happened. I just feel grateful it is now working again for everyone, and as a result of this, we have all learned better ways to back up our data in the event something crazy like this happens again. I also feel grateful no one lost any saved data in their archives.

Hi Kartik and all,

About the root cause: not clear yet. I've talked to 2 support staff from Microsoft on the phone and 4 chats. Thanks to all the Microsoft staff involved, especially Vikram and Terrence Y who have been very helpful.

At the end all my OneNote files are syncing properly now, and I didn't have to restore a backup file, but no answer on the question what caused the issue, or how the issue was solved (by them). Maybe that will come.

The only change that happend on my side, is an update of my OneNote office client to version 16.0.7167.2036.

An updated summary of lessons learned:

1. Use OneDrive for business if you can and put your OneNotes there. Although also on a regular OneDrive, files can be restored to a previous version.
2. Backup your OneNotes frequently (every 12 hours?). See File > Settings > Backup.
3. When you are in touch with a MSFT support person via chat, ask for a case number and an url to return to the chat when connection is lost. Happend to me 3 times...
4. When your OneNote has sync issues, especially with error code 0xE4020017, do not panic and do not start with closing your local OneNotesfor instance. That way you will only loose your last edits.
5. Only think about closing your local version when you've opened the online version and there all sections are accessible and in good condition.
6. Online support via Twitter @microsofthelps did not give much results. Maybe I should have gone into DM with them?
7. If the online version of your OneNote is broken, then COPY pages (or sections) from your local (also corrupt?) notebook into a new local OneNote. You can do this page by page and monitor synchronisation after each.

That is a safety and rescue operation. You can do this also on other devices that have the same OneNote in local version. It might be good to cut their internet connection during that operation. 8. Check also this document "Troubleshoot synchronization errors in OneNote 2016 for Windows". 9. Keep enjoying the power of OneNote. It still is a great product.

Best regards from Belgium.

All's well that ends well...

But I'm still curious about what caused all this...

Bart

Hi,

It's indeed great if the problem has been fixed. I'm not risking it for the next few days, I've lost too much already (time and data) :-/

Interestingly, I received an email about a month back from Microsoft that my OneDrive free storage limits were being reduced. Since I was received out of disk space / improper rights errors like HB_ZA here (http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/office/forum/office\_2013\_release-onenote/onenote-notebook-sync-error/a8287cfb-871a-4de7-90f8-e6b77222e372), I was wondering if these two things are somehow related.

However, I had several GB free even after the reduced, and the user at the link above has 60 GB free on OneDrive. Really curious as to what Microsoft will come up with as an explanation. Disappointing as it is, it must be even worse for the Business customers who are paying for it.

--Kartik

Hi Guys,

Syncing works fine now. For my PC that's still experiencing the error, I just closed and reopened the notebook.

I think you're right. Looks like the affected pages can just be opened up and they work fine. No need to revert to backups.