Unable to log food items from the database (no problem with recent or favorites)

[RayFromTampa]

When I am entering food items, if I try to enter a food item that I look up in the database, it just spins forever if the prior entered items have not yet registered and are showing correctly in the summary screen total for the day.  It allows me to enter Recent or Favorite foods but it takes a long time to register the items so this slows down entry and makes me go out and keep syncing over and over and sometimes just quit trying and come back hours later.  Once the summary for the day shows up correctly, it will allow me to enter the food items from the database.  I have reset and cleared the cache and done all of the other things to clear and start over and it starts doing the same thing again.  Note that I have logged all food for 5 years and this started happening about 2 years ago upon downloading a new version of Fitbit that showed suggested recipes.  Once that feature came in, this has been a problem.  I am not saying that the recipes created aproblem but that version did.  I have selected not to view recipes.

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[CindyMFitbit]

Hi  @RayFromTampa. Welcome to the Community Forums. 

I appreciate the details and feedback shared on your post, I understand that this can be very frustrating. Thank you for your troubleshooting efforts

If you haven't done so, I recommend trying the following: 

1. Make sure your iPhone or iPad is running the latest version of iOS.
2. Log out from the Fitbit app.
3. Force quit the Fitbit app.
4. Reboot your phone.
5. Open the Fitbit app and log back in to your account.
6. Try to log food. You can confirm the steps in How do I track my food with the Fitbit app?

Hope this helps. 

[RayFromTampa]

I had tried that as it was listed on a prior string related to a similar
topic. It worked to clear the current jam but as soon the very next time I
entered food, it came to the same congestion. That is how I found out that
I simply had to keep syncing 1, 2, 3 , 4 . times in order for the summary
screen to eventually show the right total for the day. Once that occurs, I
can go back in and enter food from the database. But this is painstakingly
tedious. I can see sometimes the food line items shuffling up and down in
the list as the Fitbit app is trying to register everything correctly if I
stay on the food entry screen. But this takes a long time and is not quick.
It happens more often when I am using something recent that has a group of
other food items associated with it and I select a few of those items again.
For instance, I eat the same thing for breakfast every day or something
similar, so there are 6 items that go in every morning together. Well
forget it if I have to enter something from the database after that.



Many times I am playng catchup where I am entering 2-3 days at a time. This
used to be easy before this problem developed because the more common items
I entered, the easier they were to find. Now, the more common items, the
more it clogs up the use of the database items. I try to enter all of the
database items first, when the slate is clean but invariably, it still loses
track or I have to delete something or whatever happens to clog it up.



There must be some process going on behind the scenes and it seems to work
very slowly for my phone. I have been inputting food for years so maybe it
is the amount of food that has been entered in the past that eventually
slows it down. But that would be a real shame because it seems to me that
it becomes a more valuable tool as you can go back at look at various eating
patterns, workouts and weight gain/loss and get some real insight on your
personal metabolism.



I hope this helps us get closer to an answer.

[RayFromTampa]

Update:  I got a new phone with a faster chip and more RAM and, at least for the time being, it seems to be processing the prior food entries fast enough that I can enter food items from the database quickly again.  Maybe it was the way that the file worked with my old phone or some temp or cache file that was not getting flushed out when I restarted but got flushed when I went to a new phone, but whatever it is, it seems to be resolved at this time and has been working for a couple days now (which is longer than in the recent past).

[CindyMFitbit]

Hi there @RayFromTampa. 

I'm so happy to hear that everything is working fine after switching to an new phone. I really appreciate all the details that you have shared about this situation, because this will help us to continue working on improving our devices and user experiences, and your comments are always welcome.

See you around. 

[Dianne5]

I’ve been having this problem too. Very annoying. I tried suggested fixes and it did little to fix the problem. Still unable to log certain foods. Still getting duplicate entries. Summary totals not matching actual entry totals although I have figured out that that duplicate showing on the summary will eventually show in the actual food recordings. So I would have to say clearing the cache etc did not work