Scarier than a werewolf: the Colab runtime you forgot to disconnect

Do you know what’s scarier than a werewolf?

A rogue Google Colab runtime you forgot to disconnect, quietly feeding on your compute units long after you’ve gone to bed.

Sound familiar? You’ve been training late into the night under a full moon. You’re exhausted, you close the laptop, and you walk away. Meanwhile your GPU runtime keeps running, and keeps billing, all night long.

Your silver bullet: Colab Idle Guard

Colab Idle Guard is a free watchdog for Google Colab. It sits in your Windows tray and keeps watch so you don’t have to.

• Tracks idle time across Colab in Chrome and in VS Code. Only Colab activity resets the timer.
• Never interrupts a running cell. If your training is still going, it stays out of the way, and if it isn’t sure, it doesn’t act.
• Warns you before acting, with a countdown and a one-click Keep runtime button.
• Can release idle runtimes automatically once you switch that on, so the meter stops even while you’re asleep.
• Runs entirely on your machine. No cloud service, no telemetry, nothing leaves your computer.

Automatic release is off by default. Releasing a runtime deletes its working state (variables and files under /content), though your notebook itself is kept, so you decide when the guard is allowed to pull the trigger.

Get it

Colab Idle Guard is free and open source under the MIT License.

Get Colab Idle Guard on GitHub

Sleep well. The guard is watching.

Questions, or a runtime that’s been haunting you? Email help@misttechnologies.net or open an issue on GitHub.

Mike Steier, Founder

Colab Idle Guard is an independent project and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Google. “Colab” is a trademark of Google LLC.