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How can I backup and restore android when switching mobiles and changing ROM? (self.askandroid)

submitted 1 year ago by RogueBanana to c/[email protected]

6 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hi I am looking for an easy way to backup parts of my mobile like some apps and folders to my pc and restore it after changing rom or to another mobile. I am using nobara linux and android 13. Need some open source linux solutions that can be done in few clicks or commands. Assuming they would be using adb commands but can use fdroid apps if it can work without rooting as well. My current mobile is rooted but not sure if I will be rooting it again with another rom.

If that isn't available could just make a script to use certain commands. Need to backup the following stuff,

F-droid and it's installed apps I do have fdroidcl installed but haven't figured out the commands for it yet
Aurora and it's installed apps No idea how to do that
Aegis Auth I do have auto backup on so do I only take those files?
Bitwarden It is saved in cloud so can do it manually if it's messy
Few other apps if possible Not sure if taking a copy of certain data folders would work and no idea how many of them are there. Does it work for Aegis and Bitwarden as well? Both would be encrypted but if the key is my password then should be fine I suppose.

Still not that knowledgeable in these things so would be nice if the instructions are easy to understand.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Others please correct me if I'm wrong but f you're not rooted (and don't have a system with backup like Seedvault) you're reliant on what backup functions the individual apps provide have. For a program to back up the data of other apps it needs root privileges (which is good otherwise apps could just read / write data of other apps).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

You are correct. Apps have to opt in to support any backup of their private data. This is intended as a privacy measure.

The only way around it is to fundamentally break Android security protections.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

How terrible, apps being able to read all the data on your device when you give them permission to do so. The restrictiveness of SAF is so annoying on Android.

'No you can't use this folder, and there is literally no way to bypass this screen. You just can't read/write to it.'

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I'd pull the entire internal storage down to a hard drive/folder, as that's really the only stuff you can get at without root anyhow. These days, most things are tied to your Google account on Android anyhow, and what isn't, is generally stored locally.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Only apps with root can see the private app data in /data/data/ or /data/user/*/ that stores your app preferences, login info, databases, etc.

Without root, you can have some extra permissions by installing Shizuku - you will need adb to grant Shizuku those rights (this app is used to give those permissions to other apps supporting Shizuku - check those here https://github.com/ThePBone/awesome-shizuku ). For example Swift Backup works best with root, but without it it can still backup at least external app data (located in Android/data)

You used to be able to do proper backups via adb, but now you rely on app devs using proper backup methods via Google drive thing, and very few of them do.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Neobackup if you're rooting

If not... idk