Does anyone know where the E-Mail account settings files are kept? A replacement phone is scheduled to hit me on Wednesday, and if I can help it, I would prefer not to setup my myriad of e-mail accounts all over again. It sure would be nice if I could just copy them to my computer and copy them back to the replacement phone.
TIA
I solved that problem by forwarding all my email accounts through gmail.
I prefer to have separate accounts, as discussed in posts #11 and #13 of the thread below:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=27810568#post27810568
xv-6800 said:
I prefer to have separate accounts, as discussed in posts #11 and #13 of the thread below:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=27810568#post27810568
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So in other words, you can't simply use gmail because its too much hassle to remember to select the correct account to reply from?
I believe most settings info is stored like this:
/data/data/nameofapplication/
What do you mean? The way I have it set up ENABLES me to select the proper account to reply from. Google does not offer this capability.
Regarding the path:
I have a .data folder on the root. Inside that is a nested mail folder which contains nothing but another empty nested folder entitled attachthumb.
Do I need a special app to see what I need to see?
xv-6800 said:
What do you mean? The way I have it set up ENABLES me to select the proper account to reply from. Google does not offer this capability.
Regarding the path:
I have a .data folder on the root. Inside that is a nested mail folder which contains nothing but another empty nested folder entitled attachthumb.
Do I need a special app to see what I need to see?
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Don't know what you're talking about because i'm using the stock Android AOSP version of the gmail app and I have 5 accounts set up on it and can select which one to reply from. It automatically selects the correct account if I simply hit "reply" from an email, however I can force it to reply from any other of my accounts too. Not all gmail accounts either. I can send mail from my cox.net account directly from the gmail app on my phone.
Anyways, you need a root file explorer. You will go to the "/data/data/" directory, then look for a directory containing the name of your email app (like /data/data/com.google.android.gm/ for gmail, etc)
That directory contains the settings and data from that app. Copy it, place on your new device in the same folder after installing the app on the new device.
a.mcdear said:
Don't know what you're talking about because i'm using the stock Android AOSP version of the gmail app and I have 5 accounts set up on it and can select which one to reply from. It automatically selects the correct account if I simply hit "reply" from an email, however I can force it to reply from any other of my accounts too. Not all gmail accounts either. I can send mail from my cox.net account directly from the gmail app on my phone.
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I think there may be a misunderstanding here. My phone has 2 apps. One is entitled Mail, the other entitled GMail. The GMail app only allows for GMail accounts. I am using the other Mail app. KZOODROID said he was forwarding his other accounts to a GMail account, which does NOT allow what you and I are doing with the Mail app. Not even logging into GMail via a web browser allows you to do this, because on the web replies still go with GMail text saying "Sent of behalf of..."
FWIW, the Mail app on the phone does NOT select the correct account if you are using your GMail account to POP another account, or you have other accounts set to forward to your GMail account, and those messages are pushed via GMail. In both those instances, when you hit Reply, the reply will be sent via your GMail address. You MUST select the desired account you want to reply from (provided you have it setup in the Mail app), if you want the reply to be seen as being sent from the same address that it was originally sent to.
Now, if you truly are pulling mail from your other non-GMail accounts (or the messages are being pushed from those mail accounts' servers), then yes, when you hit Reply on any of those messages, it's just like hitting reply on a regular mail client on a desktop computer, and the replies take on reply information from the respective mail accounts.
Anyways, you need a root file explorer. You will go to the "/data/data/" directory, then look for a directory containing the name of your email app (like /data/data/com.google.android.gm/ for gmail, etc)
That directory contains the settings and data from that app. Copy it, place on your new device in the same folder after installing the app on the new device.
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I figured as much. Does the root file explorer get installed on a PC, or is it an app you download to the phone, and then use on the phone to copy such values to an SD card?
Any suggestions on which root file explorer?
In the gmail app, hit menu then compose, at the top of the new email is a pull down menu with your @gmail.com account listed first and a down arrow. If you open this menu all your email accounts linked to gmail are listed with the option to send as for any account. I believe you can only add the accounts to gmail from a PC, at least that is how I set it up under the settings button, check mail from other accounts, send mail as, import mail and contacts, its all there. This way you never have to worry about adding multiple accounts again or copy files, its always there from now on.
Root Explorer is an app in the market, cost a buck I think, well worth it. ES File Explorer does the same thing and can connect wirelessly to other devices and is free. I use both.
Edit: calling it forwarding was probably the wrong term to use as you are granting gmail permission to check for email on the other accounts and if it finds new emails it grabs them and pushes them to your phone. You can then repond to them either using the account they came from or with your gmail account as I described above.
kzoodroid said:
In the gmail app, hit menu then compose, at the top of the new email is a pull down menu with your @gmail.com account listed first and a down arrow. If you open this menu all your email accounts linked to gmail are listed with the option to send as for any account. I believe you can only add the accounts to gmail from a PC, at least that is how I set it up under the settings button, check mail from other accounts, send mail as, import mail and contacts, its all there. This way you never have to worry about adding multiple accounts again or copy files, its always there from now on.
Root Explorer is an app in the market, cost a buck I think, well worth it. ES File Explorer does the same thing and can connect wirelessly to other devices and is free. I use both.
Edit: calling it forwarding was probably the wrong term to use as you are granting gmail permission to check for email on the other accounts and if it finds new emails it grabs them and pushes them to your phone. You can then repond to them either using the account they came from or with your gmail account as I described above.
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Yes, what you're describing must be set up on the PC. And, when you send an e-mail you can select which account you want it to SAY it's being sent from. But, the header on the message will still show your GMail account.
When you grant permission to have GMail check your others accounts, you're telling GMail to "POP" or pull the mail from the other account. Problem is that GMail again puts its "spit" on the message, instead of maintaining the original message header. That becomes a problem for me, and likely others in business, in that because of this, when you reply using the GMail convention of selecting a particular address, the recipient sees plain as day that the message was sent "on behalf of" whatever email address you chose to send from. Not very professional.
But, when you have multiple accounts setup in the AOSP Mail app on the phone, when you choose a different address to reply from, the app actually sends the message from that e-mail account, so the recipient sees only the info from that account, which is the way it should be.
Don't get me wrong, GMail is great for personal use, but when it comes to professional environments, you don't want people you're doing business with to see some generic e-mail address, you want them to see something coming from the company's domain. For example, would rather do business with someone with an e-mail address like [email protected], or [email protected]?
In fact, that's the biggest complaint with GMail and Android in the business world. Not enough native business support. And, that's fine for Google because there are more individuals in the world than companies, meaning more unit sales at higher prices. Problem for people like me is that cell carriers have heavily adopted Google's OS, which right now limits how much we can rely on Android phones in the work place. It's sad, because the hardware is technically awesome these days, and the OS itself has a lot going for it, but it's little things like the mail issue that show much of a babe in the woods Android is in the business world, and that makes it not quite ready for business prime time use... yet! It is getting there, though. Whoever wrote the Mail app is obviously an early business adopter who recognized the need, and as more people start to see things like what I've been able to do with it, albeit it's a workaround, I'm sure more business-savy developers will jump on the wagon, and make it easier to do more things conducive to "business" in the future. The ironic thing is that individuals are the ones driving Android because people with real jobs don't have time to dive in and figure out the workarounds that would show them the potential, you know?
I think Microsoft and a lot of the business world has realized that Google has not done enough to demonstrate an keen interest in the business world, and I predict that at the end of the year when Windows Phone comes back, it will likely come back with a vengeance and address all the stuff Android is lacking at the moment. After all, Microsoft ruled the business world for so long, they know what needs to be done. With the economies suffering, they've been smart not to try to bring something to market in an industry hampered by business spending freezes. But, the time is near.
Anyway, thanks for pointing me to the root file explorers. Will I need to root the phone before being able to use them to save those email account settings, or will they work on an unrooted device since I am only copying files? I ask because I don't want to go to the hassle to root and unroot again since I have to send the phone back to VZW when the new one arrives, does that make sense?
You have to be rooted to access the files using a file explorer.
When I send emails through gmail on my phone using the send as function I'm not getting anything like you are talking about in my emails. They show up as being sent from the account I choose not from gmail. However if you right click the email, select properties then open up details you see that it came from the gmail account but its buried in all the lines of code. And how many people actually do this? My clients that I work with don't really care where an email came from just that I answered. If I worked for a larger company like say Verizon than I could see that it matters but then again I'm not having that problem with gmail it works just as described for me.
xv-6800 said:
I think there may be a misunderstanding here. My phone has 2 apps. One is entitled Mail, the other entitled GMail. The GMail app only allows for GMail accounts. I am using the other Mail app. KZOODROID said he was forwarding his other accounts to a GMail account, which does NOT allow what you and I are doing with the Mail app. Not even logging into GMail via a web browser allows you to do this, because on the web replies still go with GMail text saying "Sent of behalf of..."
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I don't know what I did, but mine no longer say "sent on behalf of..". I believe it was something I configured on the gmail settings from the website, not from the app on the phone, but the settings have carried over.
If I send email from my cox account, it comes to you from [email protected]. If I send you an email from my work address, it similarly comes from [email protected].
I use the stock gmail app for all emails. I've removed all else, exchange, mail, etc. So I know for a fact that gmail will work the way you want it to, its just been so long since I've set it up that I can no longer tell you what I did.
as far as copying your files from one phone to another, you will need to be rooted, and you will need a file explorer. This is something like ESFile Explorer from the play store. Its installed on your phone, not the computer. You shouldn't need a computer for anything, actually, after you're rooted. All of this stuff can be done with simple apps and your sdcard and your phone(s).
Re: a reply e-mail sent from a different address set up on your GMail account:
I've tested this many times over the the years, as well as again last night. Regardless of whether the message is sent from GMail on the web or the GMail app on the phone, the result is the same, GMail ALWAYS inserts that "on behalf [email protected]". That's part of their marketing strategy, and there is no option to remove that. Period.
If you look at a reply sent in this way in a REAL e-mail program, not a mail applet on your phone or a web browser, you see that statement plain as day. For example, below are 2 snippets of what you see when you view such a message received in Outlook. No right-clicking or anything, I just open the message to read it. One was sent from the GMail app on the phone, the other from GMail via a web browser. You cannot help but see this statement, because that's what Google wants people to see to further their market awareness strategy.
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Let's put this particular issue to bed, shall we? I am not criticizing anyone's use of this "feature". I am simply showing the facts of how it works. If the option works for you, fine. I own multiple companies, and personally, I don't want people to whom I send messages see some gimmick like that on any of my e-mails, nor do I want any of employees sending company messages like that either. And, many businesses obviously feel the same way.
Again, I am not here to criticize users of GMail. The "on behalf [email protected]" is undeniably inserted in any reply sent from a different address set up on your GMail account. The only reason I ended up hijacking my own thread is because someone suggested I use my GMail address for everything, and I stated why I preferred not to. A misunderstanding of the option's behavior came up, and I figured I would show how the option REALLY works so that anyone else who happens upon this thread doesn't get misled by Google.
So back to the original topic of this thread:
Thanks for the info on the file explorers. I think I better just re-enter the email account info again on the new phone. This is a warranty replacement issue, and it's not worth risking something going wrong on the phone being sent back, or Verizon seeing some trace that I modded it. I'm sure they would have no problem blaming me for the original problem with the unit, then sticking me with the cost, which would likely be that so-called phony $600 retail price. :crying:
xv-6800 said:
Re: a reply e-mail sent from a different address set up on your GMail account:
I've tested this many times over the the years, as well as again last night. Regardless of whether the message is sent from GMail on the web or the GMail app on the phone, the result is the same, GMail ALWAYS inserts that "on behalf [email protected]". That's part of their marketing strategy, and there is no option to remove that. Period.
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I use a "real email program", both Outlook 2003 and Windows Live Mail and neither of them show "on behalf of gmail". It only shows the send as email account that I choose. Something is either wrong with the way you set up gmail to use send as or the email program you are using is doing it. Its not a conspiracy by Google as you seem to be the only one having this issue.
I wasn't here to start an argument with you. Check the image in my attachment and tell me if you see a "on behalf of" in there cause I can't find it...
LOL I didn't say it was a conspiracy. And, I doubt I am the "only one" that has this problem. ;-)
Google obvious does it for market awareness, which is understandable. As a company, they SHOULD try to brand everything they can, just like companies do.
Anyway, I used to use Outlook 2003, and am now on 2007. I also checked my GMail settings (again). The only options you have in regards to send as are:
When replying to a message:
Reply from the same address the message was sent to
Always reply from default address
And, I have the first one checked.
I don't want to continuer to beat this dead horse, but out of curiosity, in your Outlook can you see the From field in the spearate section above the message itself?
Aha! I just discovered that on January, 2012, Google added a new option that supposedly addresses the aliasing "on behalf of". Of course, it's not where you would think it is. It was added to the spot where you setup the Send As address to begin with. I will check it out.
If you know how to set up a basic mail server, there's also a simple workaround for you:
1) set up an smtp server, perhaps just in a virtual machine on a home computer, and then create the necessary rules on your router so that you can access it from the web.
2) Configure this smtp server to accept all your various email login credentials and send email from all your various addresses.
3) create a line in your /system/etc/hosts file on your phone to redirect smtp.gmail.com to your IP address at home. Do not modify anything for imap.gmail.com.
4) profit?
This should essentially force anything on your phone that tries to send any email from smtp.gmail.com (mainly the gmail app) to reroute to your own smtp server, which is now configured to send emails from any of your addresses.
xv-6800 said:
Aha! I just discovered that on January, 2012, Google added a new option that supposedly addresses the aliasing "on behalf of". Of course, it's not where you would think it is. It was added to the spot where you setup the Send As address to begin with. I will check it out.
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Now I feel like an ass, I used Windows Live Mail on my laptop to test this, sent emails from all my accounts and never saw anything except the send as address and I never saw the "on behalf of gmail". So for giggles I sent a test message to my work account on Outlook on my desktop and there it was plain as day. Now why does Outlook show it but Windows Live Mail doesn't?
I feel like an ass, too, so don't worry.
When I sent that last message, I went in and set the "no alias" thing, then sent a message, and am STILL waiting for that test reply message to arrive. I wonder if it ever will, now that I set it with the new option.
I should clarify that the new "anti-alias" thing also adds other options, like whether or not you want the reply sent via google's servers or through your own. Problem with sending via your own is that Google only offers certain sending ports, which are different than those which my companies use, and Google only allows you to choose from 3 ports. So, that's useless to me. I opted to use the Google servers, but now I'm not sure if that throws yet another kink into things, because I am STILL awaiting the test message arrival. It's been 30 minutes now. So much for using the new feature for time-sensitive communication, never mind of the message is sent at all! ;-)