[Q] Titanium Backup - Safe Restore Questions - AT&T Samsung Galaxy S II SGH-I777

I am an avid fan of Titanium backup since I'm a data-packrat. But, occasionally when upgrading ROM versions I have Force Close issues when I restore, and this I know can be caused by restoring things that 'shouldn't be' restored. I would like to know how to correctly restore with TiBu, what things can be restored, and what things I'm going to have to just face resetting up.
Below find a list of things that I really would prefer to be able to backup and not have to redo every time:
Contacts
Call Logs
SMS Log
Home Screens and widget/shortcuts
Wifi settings
Bluetooth pairings
Android OS configurations
User App backup and restore, I know, shouldn't be a problem at all.. It's the things integrated in to the ROM that are problematic. I would appreciate any guidance on how to go about figuring this out as I hate the FC issues that I occasionally run in to.

All those are system-related functions and should never be restored across different ROMs.

Use this.
SMS Backup & Restore
Call logs Backup & Restore
Sync contacts with Google.
For launcher you have to redo it to avoid problems unless you use a custom one like GoLauncher where you can backup.
As for - Wifi settings, Bluetooth pairings...I am not exactly sure.
Miami_Son said:
All those are system-related functions and should never be restored across different ROMs.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True, but there is other methods of backing them up safely.

Thank you for the responses so far. Just for reference I will not ever under any circumstances sync my contacts with my google accounts, that has, in the past, just lead to an INSANELY large contact list.
I have an application called: Super Backup: SMS & Contacts that can backup the Call log, Contacts, and SMS history and sucessfully restore them just fine. I just prefer an integrated solution and not having to backup a dozen different things with a dozen different apps.. that is what Titanium Backup is _FOR_ is it not?
I appreciate the thoughts so far and ask this, In TiBu various items in the app list have different colors. Green, white, red.. Are those indications of 'Safe to restore' vs 'Not safe to restore'. Or are they more 'integrated in to ROM' vs 'user app'?
I hear what you're all saying about 'only restore user apps across roms'.. But resetting wifi config, android config options, etcetcetc every time is frustrating at best.

You should try enabling the setting "I'll add contacts myself" in gmail. That solved my problems at least. After that, just cleaning up the existing contacts was all I needed to do.

LiLChris06 said:
True, but there is other methods of backing them up safely.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know, but the question was specifically about TiBU.

Related

Question on Titatinum Backup Pro / Restoring home/lock screen

I posted this in a thread in the Themes section, but didn't get any bite, so I thought I would move it here.
Forgive me as I am new to all of this. I am running BAMF Remix 1.6.3. I have Titanium Backup Pro. I have been following this thread for sometime now and like the different options people have on their phones. After I put a lot of work into customizing my home/lock screen using the widget app's, launcher app's, etc...If I were to flash to a new ROM or flash BAMF 2.x, is there a way via Titanium Pro (something else) to get those same home/lock screens back quickly?
After my other flashes, I have used TB to restore my app & app data, but have been nervous about restoring system data, etc. b/c I don't know if I am restoring something old over something new.
Any help on this?
try it, just back up your rom in recovery first in case it doesn't work
usually a bad idea to restore system data. youre not really going to be able to instantly restore your homescreen widgets, etc. when you create a widget its creates a sort of unique ID for that widget. when you wipe and flash a new ROM, that ID doesnt exist, so the widgets are gone. and even in launcherpro when you restore your home screen, all the widgets just show "error loading." so unless someone else has found a solution, (ive never heard of one) you pretty much just have to bite the bullet and manually recreate all of your widgets whenever you wipe.
Im glad this topic was raised and I can live with re-adding widgets BUT
what I hate is having to log back into EVERY SINGLE app, Facebook, Pandora, Groupon etc etc
How can I safely get all that data back after flashing a new rom? I do have titanium pro, but the one time I used it, it was a nightmare restored crap that wasn't included in the ROM like the WidgetPicker app and caused all kinds of problems
You can load App+Data or Data for the apps from TB
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
Yea just use the batch restore apps + Data. But don't do system data, that never works good.
I back up HTC Sense Home each time and my home screens come out just like I left it, but you do have to re-add Widgets.
Can't remember exact name but it's there in Titanium.
greenfday6 said:
Yea just use the batch restore apps + Data. But don't do system data, that never works good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For further education: restoring apps + data restores the applications and settings from apps that you have installed from the market, Amazon, etc. The data & settings are not ROM specific, so they restore well.
Restoring system data has you restoring ROM-related data & settings. Often things are different from ROM to ROM, so trying to restore from 1 to another causes problems. The only system setting I have ever restored was the data for "Bluetooth Pairings", which seemed to work o.k., but since pairing is simple enough, I don't do that either.
Either way, most times that you switch ROMs you will have to redo widgets, even from something like Beautiful Widgets or Widget Locker. Even though you back up those apps & their data, the widgets hook into the ROMs at the system level enough that they don't survive a restore anyway.
gohamstergo said:
usually a bad idea to restore system data. youre not really going to be able to instantly restore your homescreen widgets, etc. when you create a widget its creates a sort of unique ID for that widget. when you wipe and flash a new ROM, that ID doesnt exist, so the widgets are gone. and even in launcherpro when you restore your home screen, all the widgets just show "error loading." so unless someone else has found a solution, (ive never heard of one) you pretty much just have to bite the bullet and manually recreate all of your widgets whenever you wipe.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is true for Android widgets with launcher pro, but you can successfully restore any of the launcher pro widgets you use with no problems.

[Q] Restores

I'm new to the Android thing and even more new to the switching ROM's on a daily basis based on my mood when I wake up. Here's my question. When updating a ROM and wiping the device what do you use/do to ensure you don't have to spend a day to recover your device back to where it was. App icon locations, widgets configurations, etc...
Hi. Im pretty new to Android as well so I can tell you what I do. Now this doesnt mean its correct. I usually make a backup with Titanium Back up. Also before I do anything major I also run a backup with CWM (think thats what its called). This way I can always go back to the previous state.
Titanium Backup for restoring apps
Call Logs Backup and Restore for, well... that one should be self explanatory
Same for SMS Backup and Restore
Restoring system settings and launcher layout is a ***** if you use the stock launcher - a third-party launcher such as LauncherPro can have its settings backed up with TiBu and restored. Some even have their own backup/restore functions.
Entropy512 said:
Titanium Backup for restoring apps
Call Logs Backup and Restore for, well... that one should be self explanatory
Same for SMS Backup and Restore
Restoring system settings and launcher layout is a ***** if you use the stock launcher - a third-party launcher such as LauncherPro can have its settings backed up with TiBu and restored. Some even have their own backup/restore functions.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. I was using Go Launcher but it was flaking out regularly. Locker wasn't working, kept prompting when going to the home screen asking for if I wanted to use Go Launcher etc. Finally got rid of it because things were wonky with it. I guess I"m just stuck doing the whole reinstalling all apps and rebuilding my 'ui' whenever I do wipe.
The only thing that I have yet to find a backup/restore for is MMS.
Yes there is ways to actually save the pictures and have them in Gmail but no way of restoring it back into the conversation.

[Help!] Restoring from Titanium Backup breaks some GCM push notifications

As the title states, I was wondering if anyone out there happens to know why restoring an app+data from Titanium Backup after a Factory Reset causes Push Messages (GCM I believe) to stop working. It seems fairly obvious that when restoring an app+app data from a previous installation, they get confused and the push messages aren't being delivered to the right place.
So far the only solution that I've found to the problem is to wipe the app's data, and restart from scratch.
I've done a lot of Google searching, and I have seen that there are a handful of other people who have had this same problem, but I have yet to see anyone come up with a working solution, though there have been a few things I've tried. This is my normal procedure I do when I upgrade/flash a new rom:
Code:
-Backup with Titanium Backup
-Backup with GO Backup
-Nandroid with TWRP
-Factory Reset
-Flash ROM
-Wipe Cache/Dalvik
-Boot
-Sign into Google Account
-Install Titanium Backup
-Restore previous Android ID
-Reboot
-Use Titanium Backup to restore Apps+AppData, as well as some system settings
-Reboot
At this point, some of my GCM push notifications don't work. The only way I can get them to work again is to wipe the app's data and start from scratch. I have tried the following things, none of which worked, but they might provide helpful information.
Code:
-Wiped the app data, restored the app data by itself again.
-Uninstalled the app, installed from Google Play, restored app data.
-Used Application Manager to disable notifications, then re-enabled.
-Went into the app's settings to disable notifications, then re-enabled.
-Cleared data on Google Services Framework
-Removed Google Account, cleared data on Google Services Framework, rebooted.
[B] (This actually had an even worse side effect of re-breaking GCM push
notifications for all of the apps I had fixed by hand)[/B]
At this point I'm at a loss, I'm not sure what else to try. It kind of looks like the Google Account/GSF is related to GCM. I don't remember exactly, but I think I tried restoring the previous GSF App+Data on my most recent flash, and it still didn't work.
Anyways, I'm kind of rambling, if anyone is able to provide any insight or help, it would be greatly appreciated!
----------------------------------------------------------
In case anyone is interested, here's some lists of the affected/unaffected apps.
It DOES affect the following:
Code:
Accuweather
American Express
Bejeweled
CBS Sports
Chase
Facebook
Messenger (FB)
Reddit News
Waze
XDA app
It does NOT affect the following:
Code:
Gmail
Google Now
Hangouts
PushBullet
Yahoo! Mail
try to restore only data on titanium backup, not restore app&data
Don't forget to hit THANKS button
I've tried that way, but it didn't work either
Bump for a new day D:
Would love help on this, I have the exact same problem...
I've had this problem for a long, long time (a year or two). If there's a solution, I haven't seen it yet.
Glad that I am not the only one.
Add me to the annoyance list.
I can't figure out how to get SSG2 to notify me, and that's not an app I want to clear data on as it will lose my level saves.
Voxer also has this problem.
Interestingly enough, the Risk style game LandRule has a way to refresh the Google sync services and it works perfectly.
Multiplayer->Notifications->Having trouble...->Refresh Registration.
Very handy tool to have available, need to find a way to spread to other apps!
Try removing and re-adding your Google account. After trying a few things, this either fixed it for me, or was just coincidental timing.
I do see that you tried this... but do it without clearing GSF data.
So glad I found this!
I had been researching why Voxer lost GCM notifications, with no luck and getting frustrated. Eventually stumbled across this thread and problem solved. Back story: two days ago I flashed a factory image and restored user apps & data from TiB. Never would have guessed that any thing to do with GCM "breaking". But sure enough after reading this, I cleared data in Voxer and all is well.
God bless XDA for all the little things like this. Couldn't own a phone without it.
We could really use some type of GCM interface to relink or whatever, if that's possible. Maybe even TiB would be a great vehicle for that?
OK I'm confused. So this problem is not solved?
Solved my particular problem with Voxer by clearing data. Problem with it breaking to begin with not solved.
Sent from my Moto X using Tapatalk.
So, interesting update for folks in this thread.
My push notifications in SSG have finally been fixed with the latest update.
Now I don't know if it's because something in the update fixed it or because the act of updating from the Playstore re-synced with you/Google.
Will be interesting to check next time I flash a ROM and start from scratch. Will certainly be keeping an older version of the apk to update from if needed
Had the same issue. Lost all push notifications from Whatsapp and other gcm-enabled apps after flashing to CM11 and restoring apps+data with Titanium Backup. Finally tried using the Push Notifications Fixer (root version) app and all of a sudden, my Whatsapp notifications are coming in fine. Not sure if the app really fixed the issue or if it was just a coincidence..
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2142503
[APP][2.2+][ROOT][FREE][12-SEP-2013] Push Notifications Fixer v4.1
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
Anybody else having luck with that app?
Doesn't do anything for me, tried activating service, changing to 5min and resetting to default but doesn't fix push notifications from Voxer, SSG2 or LandRule...
Anything I'm doing wrong?
I'm using the latest version of TiB and my push notifications never work after a restore. Ive been manually reinstalling any apps that send me notifications after trying everything else others in here have tried. Basically TiB is only saving my WiFis for me these days. Subscribed for a fix!
Has anyone tried backing up and restoring app data with nandroid backups and apps that handle them, instead of TiBu? OBackup, ROM Manager are a couple of apps I believe do this.
What I did is backup app+data but reinstalled from PlayStore and opened up app to where it asked you to login and then goto TiB and restored Data and it worked for me!
I wish best to luck to everyone!
Also having the same issue but I've restored so many apps that I don't know which ones, other than the obvious messengers and the like, use GCM and might have it broken. I did at least figure out that deleting the app data (or uninstalling/reinstalling from the Play Store in my case) fixes the problem on an app by app basis.
A thought occurred to me but I haven't tried it myself... Has anyone tried restoring an app while using SuperSU? I seem to recall Titanium prompting that normal SU isn't very good and should be changed for optimal results but I've always ignored it. Maybe it's affecting that part of the restore.
---------- Post added at 02:00 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:26 PM ----------
Tested my own theory with Voxer and it didn't help.
for me "Push Notifications Fixer" didn't resolve the problem with Whatsapp and UppTalk. To re-enable notifications and not lose data I do this:
1) delete AppData
2) open the App
3) login
4) restore AppData
like badboytw suggested above...

Introducing: ROM post-setup! apply settings, install apps, etc.

So I've been trying to figure out how to perform post-install actions to my ROM similar to how OEMs do it when you set your phone up for the first time. Here's what I came up with:
This video shows the process of factory resetting your device, booting up for the first time, and post-installing and activating the Xposed Framework along with a module and personalized settings for that module. Please leave feedback on what you think.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/fnclv60cj2rwk4a/VID_20140127_135834.mp4
Sweet!
Looks cool, kinda reminds me of Sashimi from the Windows Mobile days.
Could this be adapted to restore other settings, like for example, accounts (email, facebook, exchange and the like)?
miguelfp1 said:
Looks cool, kinda reminds me of Sashimi from the Windows Mobile days.
Could this be adapted to restore other settings, like for example, accounts (email, facebook, exchange and the like)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It sure can
This seems pretty cool... But isn't this almost the same as restoring app and app data with titanium backup or ROM tool box pro?
DarkManX4lf said:
This seems pretty cool... But isn't this almost the same as restoring app and app data with titanium backup or ROM tool box pro?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Kinda.... It's more for ROM chefs who would like to provide an out-of-box experience to their users with pre-defined settings, apps, and more.
This will eliminate the need for all these post-setup instructions that ROM chefs like to include in their OP. It also eliminates the need to store apps in /data/app during flash, because after you factory reset, it gets deleted. This way, you don't need to reflash the ROM and no matter how many times you factory reset, it will set up everything the way the ROM chef intended post-boot.
If I turned it into an app, or found a way to make it more user friendly, end users such as yourself would no longer have to worry about incompatibilities between different ROM versions when restoring things with TitaniumBackup.

Google app & settings backup

Hi everyone,
In the last 6 months I've been going back and forth between phones a lot (mainly because of a temperamental GS6, that got replaced by a GS7 last week). To be honest, I never really cared about backing up anything on my Android devices in the past because I would still use an iPhone as a main device (I know, I know...). Now though, my Android has become my main device and I want to back things up as seamlessly as I can - say what you want about Apple and iOS, but as a Mac user, backup is something they do really well.
I've noticed that even if I checked off everything that I had to, nothing got backed up to my account: no Wifi passwords, no app data, nothing. I did see the devices to restore from when I booted a new phone, but selecting one or another backup only asked me which apps I wanted to re-install; once done, no app data was restored. I mean, I can go to Play and re-install apps myself... the whole point is to recover my DATA in the apps... And as I mentioned, all my passwords needed to be input manually and so on.
I'm not talking about contacts or calendars, those are fine; I'm just interested in app data. Did I miss something? Am I misunderstanding what I can and cannot back up?
Thanks!
PS: I know of and have used things like Titanium, but both my GS6 and GS7 are not rooted, and I can't (because of a stupid rule from Canadian Banks of all things...) so those are not an option. I find it hard to believe there are no solutions in 2016 to back up my app data. All the backup apps I've tried back up the APKs but not the data.
Helium backup doesn't require root, so I recommend trying it out: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.koushikdutta.backup it's not as good as titanium backup though.
mosimchah said:
Helium backup doesn't require root, so I recommend trying it out: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.koushikdutta.backup it's not as good as titanium backup though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks, I've tried it but it doesn't keep application data either just the APKs
You will have to have root for this. This is due to the security of the data partition where the apps and data are being restored. Google does back up the info with apps or so they say but I have never seen it work outside of the nexus line due to oem messing with the code.

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