[Tool][Windows/Linux][4.0+] Holo Backup - Full backup without root!

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omegavesko

Senior Member
Jun 9, 2012
88
225
I personally have ADB up and running (and do my backups manually using adb backup. It does work very well on my OG Transformer, my Galaxy Note and my Nexus 7, and yes, I use it to transfer game progress between devices, and it works well). Still, this tool is useful if you don't like typing on the command line.

Do you mind if I post enhancement suggestions? (I know those are possible, and in fact, I have toyed with the idea of doing them all in a bash script, no Python needed, though I always find that manual use of ADB Backup is more useful for me, so I always put it for another day)
  • Open the list of packages on a separate window, not on the console that was used to launch the application. I first launched it from gnome-panel, and then forgot to look there when the app told me that I should check for the list of apps in the other window
  • Allow for the tool to be launched without root permissions. If so, check if adb is available to the system (I have ADB properly set up, so it's in my <user dir>/bin, but any directory that is in the $PATH variable will serve
  • Use curl or wget to check the play store (it's easy as you have the package names) and then extract the name of the app from there (sed is the typical way to do so)
  • Name the single app backups with the package name and a timestamp. add the timestamp to full backups (package_name.YYYYmmdd_HHMM.backup.ab). Add an option to name full backup (DEVICENAME.YYYYmmdd_hhmm.backup.ab)
  • Offer the option to backup multiple (but not all) apps at once.
  • Offer the option to backup multiple (but not all) apps at once, but individually (this obviously requires multiple insertions of the backup password on the device)

Thanks for the feedback! I will definitely look into implementing some of those in the future, as well as a redesign (I've been told it isn't very pretty at this point, and I agree).
 

hittingsmoke

Member
Nov 21, 2007
47
32
I just didn't have the ADB USB driver installed.

It appears to have worked but there's no feedback from the output window. Is there any way to verify backups?
 

Thassodar

Member
Oct 24, 2010
15
1
This is not true, you can backup from one device and restore to another using adb. I was originally on a Galaxy Nexus phone, but when I received the Nexus 4 I did a full backup of the Galaxy nexus, and then restored that backup onto my Nexus 4 and it worked beautifully. Though both phones probably should be running the same OS if you try this.

If this windows app is just running adb commands in the backened there's no reason why they couldnt do this.

That is new I wanted to hear! Same OS on the GS3s would be easy, it's a lot trickier coming from 2.2 on the Vibrant though. I may give it a shot anyways.
 

grayfoxmg1

Senior Member
Aug 9, 2009
1,101
605
Paw Paw, Mi
can I ask what happened when you ran this on an HTC One X(L)? I am downloading now, and will test it on my Nook Color, but was curious as to what issues popped up on the XL as that is my focus now-a-days.
 

dvgb173

Senior Member
Thanks for this. Great for people like me who just bought a new phone and still debating rooting. Or would like a pre-root backup.

Seemed to work fine on my 3 day old Razr Maxx HD.
I'm assuming it has completed when the phone kicks out of the backup screen?
It made a file of 33MB on first run.
Second run (5 minutes later after renaming first file) was 42MB.
What is the difference between options 1 & 3?
What app can I use to look at the backup file?

Thanks again! :D
 

omegavesko

Senior Member
Jun 9, 2012
88
225
Thanks for this. Great for people like me who just bought a new phone and still debating rooting. Or would like a pre-root backup.

Seemed to work fine on my 3 day old Razr Maxx HD.
I'm assuming it has completed when the phone kicks out of the backup screen?
It made a file of 33MB on first run.
Second run (5 minutes later after renaming first file) was 42MB.
What is the difference between options 1 & 3?
What app can I use to look at the backup file?

Thanks again! :D

It should be done when it returns you to the launcher, yeah.

Option 1 backs up EVERYTHING except system apps and their data. This includes the SD card.

Option 3 is the same, except the actual apps aren't backed up but their data is.
 

canford

Member
Dec 25, 2012
36
1
Do you think this would work on a STAR NOTE MT6577 N9330/N7100 Note 2 unrooted
 
Last edited:

omegavesko

Senior Member
Jun 9, 2012
88
225
Also, would anyone be willing to try and port it to Mac OS X? I've been getting requests, but don't have a Mac so it's near impossible for me to do it myself.
 

grayfoxmg1

Senior Member
Aug 9, 2009
1,101
605
Paw Paw, Mi
Also, would anyone be willing to try and port it to Mac OS X? I've been getting requests, but don't have a Mac so it's near impossible for me to do it myself.

find someone good at porting linux to unix, there are a few people on the site. Head over to the auto_patcher thread by mateorod, look at the contributors to the project and PM the guy in charge of the OSx up keep, he might be able to help.
 

cdesai

Inactive Recognized Developer
Jan 16, 2011
2,296
4,088
IN YOUR HEAD
Why does this need to run as root on Linux?

I'ld like to know why are you doing that.

Also, why "This program only works properly if you've set a 'Desktop backup password' in Developer Options. Have you done that?"
Unencrypted backups work just fine here.

And, I'ld suggest using the bundled adb binary only if the user doesn't have adb installed on his computer.
 

steevp

Senior Member
Apr 11, 2011
103
62
Also, would anyone be willing to try and port it to Mac OS X? I've been getting requests, but don't have a Mac so it's near impossible for me to do it myself.

It looks like your Linux version would work if you just change it to run a Mac adb binary.

You might need someone with a Mac to package it into a standalone executable like you did for Windows and Linux, but Mac users could still run the source file as long as they have python and PyQt4 installed.
 

Valittaja

Member
Jan 13, 2013
25
4
too good to be true..
tested this on my unrooted Samsung Galaxy S3...
The first time the app finds my phone, and lists all apps installed on it...
I choose one app I wanted to backup, it creates zero byte files.. the same with full backup..
after that it doesn't even find my phone anylonger, keeps on saying
error: device is offline when it's actually still connected...

Bottom line, does not work with unrooted Samsung Galaxy S3 Nordic patch.. (android 4.1.2)
 

mostafa5187

Member
Nov 9, 2012
15
3
lar
too good to be true..
tested this on my unrooted Samsung Galaxy S3...
The first time the app finds my phone, and lists all apps installed on it...
I choose one app I wanted to backup, it creates zero byte files.. the same with full backup..
after that it doesn't even find my phone anylonger, keeps on saying
error: device is offline when it's actually still connected...

Bottom line, does not work with unrooted Samsung Galaxy S3 Nordic patch.. (android 4.1.2)

+1

Sent from my GT-I9001 using Tapatalk 2
 

omegavesko

Senior Member
Jun 9, 2012
88
225
Why does this need to run as root on Linux?

I'ld like to know why are you doing that.

Also, why "This program only works properly if you've set a 'Desktop backup password' in Developer Options. Have you done that?"
Unencrypted backups work just fine here.

And, I'ld suggest using the bundled adb binary only if the user doesn't have adb installed on his computer.

It runs as root because adb needs root to function properly. The update I'm working on uses gksudo instead so it only prompts you for your password when it runs the adb command.

I've actually noticed that the newest Windows adb binary (pulled from the SDK a couple of days ago) doesn't seem to support adb backup. No idea why.

I recommend the desktop backup password only because the Ultimate Backup Tool devs say you need to. I'm assuming there are some devices unencrypted backups don't work on.
 

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    OSIXf6X.png

    A multiplatform GUI application I coded that uses ADB Backup to make full backups of your phone/tablet.

    Unfortunately, ADB Backup itself is rather buggy so it will often fail on many devices, and may not work at all on some (the HTC One series, Sony phones from 2011, and some Motorola phones are most often reported to not work). All of the things the Ultimate Backup Tool has trouble with also affect this application. Sorry, that's just how it works. Do report devices that don't work though, just so everyone knows about it.

    One of the best uses of ADB Backup is backing up Nexus devices before unlocking the bootloader, which wipes the device. You can then simply restore the backup to have your device in (mostly) the same state as before.

    Tested by myself on Windows 7 and Linux Mint 14. As I've only tested it on my own phone, I'm treating this as an open beta.



    Download
    http://omegavesko.github.com/SimpleADBBackup/ - Contains links to downloads in .tar and .zip formats. Both executables and source are included.

    Usage
    On Windows, simply run HoloBackup.exe.
    On Linux, run HoloBackupLinux. Running the binary as superuser is no longer necessary.

    You can also run it from source on either platform, just move the script for your platform from the /src/ directory into the parent directory.

    Source
    https://github.com/omegavesko/SimpleADBBackup - It's rather messy, I'm not too good at keeping git repos tidy. Should still work, though.

    Changelog
    v2.0 - Huge update. See GitHub page for feature list.

    v1.0 - Initial release.

    Credits
    All credits for the frameworks used do to the teams behind Python, Qt and of course the Android team.
    Also check out Ultimate Backup Tool, which inspired me to do this in the first place.
    6
    Hey thanks,

    I know this is an old post, but so an I..... Lol!

    Here is a Working Link for Win and Linux HERE

    Click on either Win of Linux
    Than just look down that page to....
    "This file has been truncated, but you can view the full file. For Win....
    Click on that working LINK!


    Same Text Link for Linux


    Might help someone!
    4
    ADB backup and restore is plenty of bugs, please recommend clockworkmod instead.

    Related adb backup and restore bugs:
    Issue 28303: adb backup doesn't respect -noshared flag
    Issue 32830: adb restore errors not displayed on device
    Issue 34311: Galaxy Nexus gets stuck when restoring adb backup
    Issue 25780: BackupManager causes reboot when BackupAgent missing
    Issue 40691: ab backup and restore Ski Safari does not restore saved data
    Issue 16286: Restoration of phone not working properly

    I'm aware of the buggy nature of ADB Backup. That's why I put warnings and disclaimers all over the place.

    CWM is obviously better at backup and restore, but you also can't install CWM in the first place without unlocking the bootloader on a lot of devices, which usually wipes the device and defeats the purpose of a non-root backup utility.
    3
    any link please ? i really want to try this

    https://github.com/omegavesko/HoloBackup

    Better do it yourself
    Enable Android ADB Backup
    The Android backup feature using adb backup is only available from Android 4.0+. To use this feature, USB debugging (under Settings -> Developer options) must be enabled on the device.

    Also, this feature does not work on all apps. To enable ADB backup for an app, that app must have set the android:allowbackup attribute to true in the Android Manifest (AndroidManifest.xml) XML file.

    Android Manifest XML File
    <application>
    ...
    android:allowBackup="true"
    ...
    </application>
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    <application>
    ...
    android:allowBackup="true"
    ...
    </application>
    Apps like the Google Authenticator have disabled the ADB backup feature to prevent sensitive information from being extracted from the device. ADB backup will not work on such apps. An attempt to perform an ADB backup on such apps will only generate a dummy file with no valid content inside.

    Perform Android ADB Backup
    To perform an ADB backup, you will first need to know the package name of the app in question. For example, if you want to perform a backup of the WhatsApp application, the package name would be “com.whatsapp“.

    You can get a list of the installed packages by running the pm list packages command from the ADB shell.

    $ adb shell pm list packages
    Another easier way is to extract the package name from the app’s Google Play Store web URL. For WhatsApp, the URL is https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.whatsapp and the package name can be found after the “id=” field.

    To perform a backup, connect the phone to the computer via USB and run the ADB backup command. If you want to backup WhatsApp, run adb like this:

    $ adb backup -f com.whatsapp.ab -noapk com.whatsapp
    This will trigger a confirmation dialog prompting you to authorise the backup on your phone as shown below. Click on the “Back up my data” button without providing a password. The backup will start only after you click on the button.

    Wait for the ADB backup command to complete. It may take a while, depending on the size of the data to be backed up. The backup will be written to the file specified in the “-f” option, in our case, it’s “com.whatsapp.ab“. The “.ab” extension indicates Android Backup. The “-noapk” option means that a backup of the .apk file is disabled and only the contents are backed up.

    Restore / Repack Android ADB Backup
    To restore the original Android Backup archive, run adb like this:

    $ adb restore com.whatsapp.ab

    A nice little helper for preparing ADB backups has landed in from switzerland:
    https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ch.masshardt.adbbackuphelper&hl=en_US

    1. To backup app data along with apk

    Type in this command:

    adb backup -f “D:\myfolder\myapp.ab” -apk <package name>

    -f parameter specifies the file location, -apk specifies to backup apk (and not only app data)

    Once you enter this command on PC you will be prompted to unlock phone screen. Unlock screen and select ‘Back Up Data’ and also enter password if you have set up any previously. This command will store the backup to myapp.ab file on your PC. To restore this back to your phone simply type in:

    adb restore “D:\myfolder\myapp.ab”

    This command will restore entire app back to your phone.

    2. To backup only app data

    To backup only data don’t pass -apk parameter. This will only backup the app data in myapp.ab file. Remember that before you restore this backup the app should already be installed on the phone (From play store or from apk file which you are supposed to have).

    3. To backup multiple apps

    If you need to backup more than one app put in all package names in <package name> parameter with single space between each name. Alternatively if you want to backup all apps on phone you can use:

    adb backup -f “D:\myfolder\myapp.ab” -all -apk -nosystem

    -nosystem parameter is used to exclude system apps from backup, as restoring system apps sometimes causes stability issues.

    4. To backup your personal data only

    adb backup -shared -f “D:\myfolder\mydata.ab”
    -shared does a backup of personal data from the internal SDcard. It used to exclude apps, but should save settings
    3
    Looks like Githib is still under maintenance....

    It just came back up.


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