The Titanium Backup Pro-version has an option to change application status from a user app to a system app and vice versa. But how can I make a TB itself into a system app? I want to do this in case of need for system factory reset. I had to factory reset my phone just a couple of hours ago, because I got it stuck so bad that I had to pull the battery out of it and when it restarted it had forgotten all the defaults and when asked about a launcher i chose Zeam and automaticly checked the option that said "use as default". Zeam then forceclosed and forceclosed and fc,fc,fc.... So basically I couldn't get anywhere. I managed to close phone and restart it, but now it remembered the defaults and opened Zeam force closing it time after another. I closed the phone again and went to CMW-recovery and wiped the caches and made a factory reset (maybe not a smartest solution, but I couldn't think of anything else). And then when opening the phone I noticed that some apps (E-mail, file manager, Talk, etc..) that aren't included in the custom ROM (void. (2.2.2; #eridanus)) but ones I had backupped from previous ROM and transfered to this were automaticly included, because when backupped, were saved as system apps and installed automaticly as such. So I went to Market and bought a Pro-version of TB and set some other apps(SlideIt keyboard) as a system ones in case I screw the phone up again, but I cant figure out how to make TB a system app itself, since then I wouldn't even have to go to Market to restore my phone in case of another factory reset.
All of the apps you downloaded will almost always placed in the folder /data/app Just use root explorer to copy the apk files there to a safe place for backup. The system apps will also be loaded during start up. They are located in /system/app You can read more in this forum in order to help yourself make progress in the learning path.
Sent from my IDEOS X5
Got it, thanks!
Sent from my u8800 using XDA Premium App
Have you tried Links2SD, it also has super powers similar to Titanium Backup, and will allow you to change it from a system app to an user app, and then to uninstall it completely.
Related
I had something strange happen with the Messaging app, so I may as well list every step I took in case one of them was important.
TL;DR: I backed up "SMS Storage" from stock ROM with Ti Backup then restored it into CM6, but my old messages were still missing. Afterward I backed up and restored CM6 with nandroid and the old messages came back. fix_permissions was used in the middle for unrelated reasons.
I had stock G2 with perma-root and I wanted to try CM6. Without thinking about my apps or their data, I simply did a backup with ROM Manager, wiped and installed CM6. (All in one step. Man, I love ROM Manager!)
When I finally logged into CM6, Android started downloading all the apps I had before. It was then that I realized, "Fuuuuuuuuuck... all my settings and data are gone." I had older backups in Titanium Backup, but I wanted everything to be up to the minute. I also backed up my ADW settings and desktop configuration. Again, what a dream!
I restored my stock ROM backup and used Titanium Backup to backup everything one more time. Then I went through the download, wipe, install process again. It was already downloaded, and ROM Manager was smart enough not to download it again. Nice.
I waited yet again for Android to reinstall all my apps. A couple didn't download right, so I massaged them. I think they had updates with permission changes.
I restored my ADW settings and icons, and launched Titanium Backup. I used the restore screen and the Batch menu option. I clicked on RUN for "Restore All Apps" or whatever, which I knew would prompt me with a giant checkbox list. I unchecked everything and went down the list checking every user app. They were the ones with white text for the most part. If there was a Google system app that I was comfortable restoring, like the data for, say, Goggles, I checked that, too. I didn't check any of the truly system things.
The restore was a success and all my apps functioned beautifully.
I then opened the Messaging app and realized that all my old text messages were missing. Here's where the weirdness more-or-less starts.
I decide to go hunting in Ti Backup to see if I can find the data for the SMS app. I first restored the one with the Messaging app icon, and that managed to restore just my preferences. That made sense afterall, because it was called "[SMS/MMS PREFS] Messaging 2.2.1".
After that I tried restoring the one called "[SMS/MMS/APN] Dialer Storage 2.2.1", thinking that this must be it. No help at all.
I sent a few text messages to one person creating new data.
GPS is broken in CM6, and someone suggested running fix_permissions from the terminal. I did so, and no help with GPS. (But did this maybe fix the SMS data?)
I realized that Swype was missing and someone posted instructions on how to restore it, but you need to be back at stock and pull the files from the stock ROM. (I also could have unzipped the stock rom image, I read later, but anyway...) I restored my old stock backup, ran the ADB commands to pull the files, then restored my CM6 backup I had made just minutes earlier. I use a combination of ADB and Root Explorer to get the files in the right spot and I have Swype again.
I open the first app I can think of to test Swype, and that's Messaging. Bam! All my old messages are back! And my few new ones are now gone!
What's up with that?
elusivebyte said:
I had something strange happen with the Messaging app, so I may as well list every step I took in case one of them was important.
TL;DR: I backed up "SMS Storage" from stock ROM with Ti Backup then restored it into CM6, but my old messages were still missing. Afterward I backed up and restored CM6 with nandroid and the old messages came back. fix_permissions was used in the middle for unrelated reasons.
I had stock G2 with perma-root and I wanted to try CM6. Without thinking about my apps or their data, I simply did a backup with ROM Manager, wiped and installed CM6. (All in one step. Man, I love ROM Manager!)
When I finally logged into CM6, Android started downloading all the apps I had before. It was then that I realized, "Fuuuuuuuuuck... all my settings and data are gone." I had older backups in Titanium Backup, but I wanted everything to be up to the minute. I also backed up my ADW settings and desktop configuration. Again, what a dream!
I restored my stock ROM backup and used Titanium Backup to backup everything one more time. Then I went through the download, wipe, install process again. It was already downloaded, and ROM Manager was smart enough not to download it again. Nice.
I waited yet again for Android to reinstall all my apps. A couple didn't download right, so I massaged them. I think they had updates with permission changes.
I restored my ADW settings and icons, and launched Titanium Backup. I used the restore screen and the Batch menu option. I clicked on RUN for "Restore All Apps" or whatever, which I knew would prompt me with a giant checkbox list. I unchecked everything and went down the list checking every user app. They were the ones with white text for the most part. If there was a Google system app that I was comfortable restoring, like the data for, say, Goggles, I checked that, too. I didn't check any of the truly system things.
The restore was a success and all my apps functioned beautifully.
I then opened the Messaging app and realized that all my old text messages were missing. Here's where the weirdness more-or-less starts.
I decide to go hunting in Ti Backup to see if I can find the data for the SMS app. I first restored the one with the Messaging app icon, and that managed to restore just my preferences. That made sense afterall, because it was called "[SMS/MMS PREFS] Messaging 2.2.1".
After that I tried restoring the one called "[SMS/MMS/APN] Dialer Storage 2.2.1", thinking that this must be it. No help at all.
I sent a few text messages to one person creating new data.
GPS is broken in CM6, and someone suggested running fix_permissions from the terminal. I did so, and no help with GPS. (But did this maybe fix the SMS data?)
I realized that Swype was missing and someone posted instructions on how to restore it, but you need to be back at stock and pull the files from the stock ROM. (I also could have unzipped the stock rom image, I read later, but anyway...) I restored my old stock backup, ran the ADB commands to pull the files, then restored my CM6 backup I had made just minutes earlier. I use a combination of ADB and Root Explorer to get the files in the right spot and I have Swype again.
I open the first app I can think of to test Swype, and that's Messaging. Bam! All my old messages are back! And my few new ones are now gone!
What's up with that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just a note, if android starts reinstalling all of your apps automatically again, that means that you have "back up data to google servers" checked in settings, which means that it will first reinstall your apps, then restore all of their settings and data.
Quick Tip for using Titanium Backup
1. Backup "application widgets". Once you restore your launcher, restore this and reboot so that your widgets will work and you don't have to reconfigure your home screen widgets (which would say "problem loading widgets" otherwise).
2. Backup "accounts" to remember the fact that you have "allowed" access to your google account for various apps (mainly google apps and any app that accesses your google account). This is also required to remember your facebook and skype passwords.
3. Backup "LogProvider" for the call log. A lot of people think call logs are backed up by "contacts storage" but they're not.
4. "contact storage" backups your speed dial
5. "dialer storage" backups your SMS/MMS. After you restore you need to reboot for it to take effect.
6. No need to backup "calendar 1.0". Just calendar 1.1. (this backups the setting not the actual content provided that you sync with google)
7. Most settings in Setting cannot be backed up (ie. Voip account, wifi hotspot ssid, ringtones, volume, etc). Simply re-enter them.
8. After upgrading your rom version or migrating to a different rom, before you restore, for "system" apps, make sure you check each one to see if the version has changed. If so, don't restore or you will probably have force-closes down the road. This is especially true if you move to cyanogen or miui, don't restore system apps at all.
9. Generally you don't need to save system apks unless you plan on uninstalling them to experiment instead of freezing.
10. Don't backup/restore "market" settings or you'll lose market links to your apps. In fact after you restore all your user apps you won't see all of them linked in the market even if titanium backup is set up to remember the links. Just use titanium to clear the market user data, restart market and you're ready to go.
11. Titanium backup does not save your default programs. (ie. DEFAULT browser, dialer, and for different file types).
12. Let TB save the settings to sd card. The next time you install TB you won't need to install the "pro" app. It remembers.
13. TB does not remember what apps are frozen. So after a reinstall, you need to refreeze whatever apps you want to freeze.
Other things good to know:
If you migrate to a new rom, although titanium Pro has an option to attempt to restore system apps to be compatible, try only restore user apps just to avoid force closes.
If you have a fixed set of apps you know you want to freeze, create a filter containing these apps. If you install a new rom, you can freeze all of them all at once without having to go through each.
Can you expand on what you mean in point 1.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
Scenario:
I have, say, go launcher or touch wiz as my launcher, I put widgets on my home screen like weather, google search bar and maybe a music player widget. I can use TB to backup my launcher, which would supposedly backup where these widgets are located on your home screen. However after reinstalling the rom, if I restore my launcher without restoring "application widgets", the place where these widgets are supposed to be will show "problem loading widgets". And you would have to remove these problematic widgets and recreate them.
So when you backup your launcher, backup "application widgets" as well. When you restore, restore both of them. And preferably after restoring, reboot before you go back to your launcher
By the way "application widgets" is an actual backupable item in TB (shown in green)
Is this making any sense?
Thanks and yes you are making perfect sense.
Many times I've had to delete then replace widgets from my launcher after restoring using TB so I'm interested in where in TB to find this option.
I'm probably looking right at it but just can't see it. Can you steer my in the right direction in TB?
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
Nice to learn new things, especially the widgets, hate having the "problem loading widget" all the time.
Thanks for highlighting these.
Ok found it.
It's an item in the app list called "application widgets" with the TB icon next to it.
Cool thanks never noticed it before.
Great tip.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA App
Having a Problem
Ok so I am tring to do an Extract from CWM Backup...
Just Flashed Jugg. 2.0 everything is running great!!!
But TBP is just stuck at Restoring 0% on my first program... I have even followed their help page. cleared the market memory... What am i doing wrong please help...
T-mobile - SGH - T989
ROM: Juggernaut 2.0
Bardouns said:
Ok so I am tring to do an Extract from CWM Backup...
Just Flashed Jugg. 2.0 everything is running great!!!
But TBP is just stuck at Restoring 0% on my first program... I have even followed their help page. cleared the market memory... What am i doing wrong please help...
T-mobile - SGH - T989
ROM: Juggernaut 2.0
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you enabled USB debugging and UNKNOWN sources?!
yes on both
---------- Post added at 08:32 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:16 AM ----------
Ok... Don't know WTF... but its working like lightning now... have no idea... didn't do anything except download google text to voice... weird
Been using it for years and didn't figure out the speeddial backup. Good post. A couple thoughts in general as far as backup strategy.... IMO freezing is better than removing system apps because space is not an issue with the sgs2 like it is with some (older) phones. Swap a lot of roms and sooner or later your are going to either on accident or purpose delete something you shouldn't have and then have to restore. Going down the list and freezing them only takes a minute and is readily reversible with the same end result. If you must be rid of them freeze them first and give it a few days for any oddness to show up. Then uninstall.
Agree on restoring system apps. Always a good way to get odd behavior or fc's and the like. Normally there is no need anyways as the new rom has the same system apps in it and most of the settings can be remembered elsewhere. I do back up system apps though in case I want to grab an apk that isn't in the new rom.
Also IMO its a good idea to copy the entire contents of the internal sd over to the pc after doing a nandroid and ti backup. This way if things go to hell you have everything. The process I use is to do a ti backup and then nandroid in recovery. I mount while still in recovery and copy everything over to a folder on the pc. Now I have all my pics, everything. I use the external sd for music and other items that I know will move from rom to rom so that I don't have to hassle with them. Do this and your covered in every way if you have problems with your ti backup or nandroid. Both can happen sometimes. Also if your phone dies, goes missing etc at least you have a backup as recent as your last rom swap which for us is probably not too long ago. lol I keep the most recent two backups and delete the oldest as I make new ones with each new rom. This only takes a few minutes extra during the rom swap and if you need it you will be glad you have it.
Thank you for tips!
Very helpful. Been using TB for a while now but did not know all the details!
thanx for your efforts...
got some useful tips. I thought I know TB, but I didn't.
Nice write-up!
Any advice on what to do when you try to restore an app and it tells you "problem parsing the package"?
Seam to happen more often with apps that did not come from Android Market or Amazon Appstore...
Very good guide and not just for newbie's.
Thank you.
App Folders i nApp Draw
i cant seem to figure out where the folders in the app draw are actually stored. i tried to do a restore from a previous rom (apps only, widgets ect) but im not sure where to go for app folders, thats if it will even do this for me.
Many Thanks...
...to the OP & others for this thread & the tips in it ;-)
Just rooted yesterday & ran TI backup. Have run it again incorporating the tips in this thread. Very good suggestion to copy the lot over to PC as well.
Also, people should remember to make a copy of their EFS file & keep that somewhere safe off the phone (keep a copy on your external SD card as well).
Everything I've read so far suggests you're royally boned if you trash your EFS, so making a couple of copies & keeping them in various spots (one on the external SD/one on PC) makes sense to me. Hellcat's kTool does a bangup job & is a nice little app to have handy ;-)
Hi everyone. If someone can give me the confirmation about the following:
1. is Titanium backup saving the settings for the backed up app or only the app itself?
2. are social hub, readers hub, game hub, talk, IM, safe to freeze or unistall cos I don't use that?
3. When you freeze the app, is the icon gone or it stays under "menu"?
4. is Email app safe to freeze/uninstall or I need that for using Gmail app?
I'm on stock 2.3.3 + CF-Root-SGS2_XX_OXA_KH1-v4.1-CWM4 for now.
thank you and regards.
Thanks - very helpful to have more information.
3. Backup "LogProvider" for the call log. A lot of people think call logs are backed up by "contacts storage" but they're not.
This was really helpful. Thank you.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
Some roms require a full wipe/factory reset before installing. Of course that will delete all apps including the one that I bought. Do I need to buy them again?
Also, will the 'titanium backup' backups the homescreen settings (i.e., the app shortcuts created on main screen)?
Your apps are attached to your gmail account, as long as you sign in on your device with the same account after flashing/wiping, you can redownload the paid apps.
Titanium backup by default will not backup homescreen settings, but if you manually backup the launcher and its data then it can restore the settings.
Sent from Sheogorath with cheese.
Yeap once you buy your apps, they're yours for good. You can sign in a whole different device and your apps in the play store still belong to you, you just open the playstore and click on the lil arrow thing up at the top for the "My Apps" page. It will open to your installed apps and if you swipe to view the page to the right it shows all apps, which includes any app you previously downloaded but isn't installed.
And also when you wipe data and install a new rom, It will have you sign into your google account in the setup process right after the wifi connection screen. Once setup is complete and you're all booted up, if you just leave the tablet alone and let it settle a few minutes, it's going to automatically install all the apps you had installed on your last rom from the play store, unless you've changed the default backup/restore settings.
Make sure with titanium backup, you NEVER install system apps, which are the red ones. You can set the filter to User apps only before backing up your apps. Then you'll load the rom and complete the setup and let it settle while it installs all the apps it's going to from the play store. Then you can just batch restore any missing apps. I would batch restore the apps only, and then go back and restore only the app data that you actually need. For instance you may want to restore a game with a thousand levels of progress, but don't restore app data just to keep from typing a username and password into an app one time which takes about four seconds.
I help a lot of new guys get started wiping, installing roms, and setting up and try to teach them along the way. I let them learn instead of doing it for them. Here's what I've found to be the best way to learn.
Make a nandroid backup of current setup. Then wipe data, cache, dalvic cache, and system, install the rom and gapps, and reboot and setup. Once it's setup let it settle in and sync and all that good stuff. You want the boxes asking if you want to back up the tablet and restore to the tablet in the setup process both checked.
After you've booted, set up, and let all the apps install that it's going to install, then reboot into recovery and make another nandroid backup, if using TWRP you can name it like "ExampleRom_B4Titanium." Now you've got a clean nandroid backup of the rom setup, and you can start playing with titanium backup and if you accidentally do something that causes problems, you can just wipe everything and restore that clean nandroid backup you made prior to Titanium.
I flash to KitKat factory image from CM10.2 (wiped everything including my internal memory), and then I flash to CM11 nightly and use titanium backup to restore only my app data. and here is where the problem comes in, none of my data is restoring from Titanium, although it says data restore completed in titanium, it actually isn't. Every apps force close when I open it after restoring. After that if I restart my phone, those app that i restored will be disappeared from my app drawer, it didn't appear in settings -> app either, if i try to install again it won't install, only way is to manually search for the apk file through file manager and delete it. I cant restore anything from titanium backup! FYI, I only backup the data of the app, not including the apk, but after restoring the app force close and restarting my phone the whole app gone missing from my app drawer. I can't lose all my data. what can I do? please help :crying::crying:
Another question, every time after u guys flash a new rom do u restore the old android ID or use new one in titanium backup?
Latest update of TB has caused some issues for many people. For me, on some roms, it fc's when I click an app to restore. Try googling for an apk of a previous version, and see if the problem persists. Regarding the id, you can keep the new one. Some functions might not work properly though, like location update. You can go into your settings for your Google account on a computer and withdraw access rights for apps and devices, then everything is fine. Hope this helps. Good luck!
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk
So i used titanium backup to remove a piece of att bloatware it was called Att App Picker or something to that effect. now every few minutes the message com.dti.att has stopped working pops up. Is there anything i can do in Titanium backup to either reinstall this program (it is the only one that I have removed) or otherwise prevent this annoying message from continually popping up.
Sorry, I can't help you. But for future reference, you may consider using TIBU to Freeze unwanted apps, at least long enough to be sure there's no problem when removed. Then if there is, you can Thaw it.
You need to search your file system for the other half of the app.
Look under /data/app
Look under /data/data
Look under system/app
Look under system/priv-app
Find any instances of the app you wanted gone and remove it and reboot. You can also try twrp and clear your cache and dalvik cache.
Furthermore.. Just go and reflash the rom over your existing build to bring it back and stop the FC
mmarsie said:
So i used titanium backup to remove a piece of att bloatware it was called Att App Picker or something to that effect. now every few minutes the message com.dti.att has stopped working pops up. Is there anything i can do in Titanium backup to either reinstall this program (it is the only one that I have removed) or otherwise prevent this annoying message from continually popping up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Go to Titanium Backup menu, hit clean up Dalvik cache. Reboot.
If that did not help, go into twrp and clean dalvik cache and cache.
Sent from my NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet K1 using XDA Labs
Ended up doing exactly that and re-flashing, When I have a little more time with the device I'll go through and do a full purge of the ATT bloat.
Team DevDigitel said:
You need to search your file system for the other half of the app.
Look under /data/app
Look under /data/data
Look under system/app
Look under system/priv-app
Find any instances of the app you wanted gone and remove it and reboot. You can also try twrp and clear your cache and dalvik cache.
Furthermore.. Just go and reflash the rom over your existing build to bring it back and stop the FC
Click to expand...
Click to collapse