TWRP write protect issue - Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I flashed my i9500 with TWRP 2.8.1.0 using Odin and it wrote an undeletable backup onto my internal memory. To get rid of that, I backed up the "BACKUPS" folder and formatted the internal storage only for it now to cause the entire internal storage to be write protected to my android apps. I can copy and delete stuff to it through PC but my apps wont work, those that require to download pics and videos or make backups to the internal storage, web browsers can't download anything to the internal storage yet I now have over 7GB free space.
It's clear TWRP is write protecting the internal storage selectively (first it wrote protected the storage to both the phone and pc, now to the phone only). How should I sort this problem out?

I have also just tried using root explorer to change permissions to the internal storage but it doesn't work. It's failing. Titanium backup shows its own backup folder is unwrittable. It cannot be changed by Root explorer
I just tried fixing permissions in twrp but to no avail. I uninstalled Clean master only to try and re-install it and it won't install now, it gives a failed install error. Kingsoft office continually shows "stopped working" and fails to work completely. All this started with flashing Twrp. I can't view pics in whats app or send them, neither can I edit documents. Any help to rid of this issue will be gladly appreciated.

People please please avoid twrp at all costs!, i have now lost all my data and apps are all failing. I deerly deerly regret why i ever flashed twrp recover in the first place!

I seem to have solved the issue after a very grueling experience.
TWRP has its flaws and it is quite notable here. Here is how I have gotten around the issue:-
Immediately after I installed TWRP I made a system backup of the entire phone as of its state at the time.
I copied it to my pc and tried to delete the backup that TWRP had made. It was completely write protected, nothing could delete it.
I then decided to use TWRP to format my internal storage after backing it up. Then restore the data back which I did successfully.
Little did I know what had happened. TWRP had assigned the internal storage attributes that even Root explorer (paid) could not undo.
The internal storage had become unusable to the system and user apps.
Slowly my apps began to collapse one after the other failing. From frustration I tried to salvage the data the apps held at the time so that I can factory reset and restore but Titanium backup could not access its own folder. That's where all the frustration begun.
I later flashed CWM and accidentally formatted all my data instead of the data partition.. this was now hell.
One last try which was about 5 hours later I returned TWRP recovery, wiped the data partition and got hold of my prior backup with TWRP, restored it and am 9 hrs back from total loss of data. So the internal storage now has its initial attributes prior to the predicament.
Am actually back exactly to where all this mayhem began when I decided to delete the "BACKUPS" folder and there was absolutely nothing else that was wrong, which now I will attempt to delete hoping that I won't experience deja vu.
This is a problem worth reporting to TWRP developers and I don't know how

TWRP recovery Fix Permissions
I couldn't delete back ups from the internal storage at all. I couldn't even copy saved back ups from my pc to my Note 3. I went into TWRP recovery, under Advanced select Fix Permissions
Now I can delete folders in the TWRP main folder with a ES file explorer or on my PC via usb cable.

Never had any problems like this with TWRP on my S4+. For me the backups taken and its folders can be handled just fine, copied, deleted, moved etc. Must be som compatibility issue with your setup.

Related

Keeping Backups ?

Well, first day I got my tab i rooted and such.
Tried a rom (wich wiped everything obviously)
installed a couple of apps then made a backup with Titanium.
decided to go back to stock rom for the time being (wait for more bugless roms)
When i tried to restore my Backups, everything was gone.
question is, Does the backup just go in general internal storage, wich is not calculated as a SD card, so gets formated everytime we wipe??
Im used to backup and wipe, on my phone wich has internal and external SD, so no problems there.
Any input ?
If I understand right, there is no separate storage on the N10. I think /sdcard is basically just an emulated folder sitting on the data partition, so anything that wipes data, will wipe the sdcard. Might want to wait for someone else to give their input on this though.
As for backups, at the most I usually just backup app's (apk files) and put them in a folder on my computer, then just reinstall all of them with Android Commander.

[Q] How to reload backup image?

I have the 32GB wi-fi version of the Nexus 7. Over a couple of months of use (and changing ROMs a few times), the storage capacity was reading very low even though I only had a couple of apps loaded. I read about how this can be a problem with the Nexus 7 and you can do a full wipe to restore the correct storage capacity. The process recommended doing a backup and storing it on your PC. I did this and then did the full wipe. The device will not boot now (Google screen only). I can get it into recovery mode but I don't know how to get my backup image onto the device. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
P.S.
I have searched the help & troubleshooting forum for two days before posting this. This is a last resort!
i'm surprised searching for "how to restore nandroid backup" didn't yield any results..
you were probably low on space due to all the backups taking up space, each one can easily take up several GBs. you should have tried to move them to PC without full wipe. they're just stored in the sdcard partition, probably in "clockworkmod/backup" or "TWRP/backup" depending on the recovery.
anyway you did a full wipe and then didn't install or restore anything afterwards. so currently you have a blank tablet with nothing installed which is why it doesn't boot .
did you copy or move the backup to your PC? when you full wiped did you only wipe the system and data partitions. i hope you didn't wipe the sdcard partition either way.
- if you copied the backup, just go back into recovery, select "backup and restore" or similar, then click "restore" and select the latest backup.
- if you moved the backup, you obviously need to move it back . within recovery you'll need to mount the sdcard when connected to PC (under "mount" option or similar), then depending on which recovery you use, move the entire backup folder to the correct location e.g. /TWRP/BACKUP/ or clockworkmod/backup. then restore.
The memory wasn't tied up in backups (or anything else that showed in storage). I had removed all but basic apps (ROM Manager, GMAIL, etc) and only kept one backup. It was odd, the available space said 3.4GB but the graph above showing available storage indicated a LOT more! It's like they are reading totally different information. Where I am getting totally stuck at is the computer does not seem to recognize the device when it's connected so I can't get the backup back onto the device. I have installed the appropriate drivers on my PC but still nothing. I really appreciate any help you can give on this!

[Q] Internal storage disappeared, can't access twrp. HELP!

Hello!
I have a major problem and I really hope you will be able to help me.
For the past several months, I've been using ParanoidAndroid (4.4.2.). Everything was great. I was using the version that had a lot of tweaks added. I used Paranoid OTA to update to versions with tweaks. Last update (04/06) had removed tweaks and the ROM had started to randomly close apps, desktop and glitching all together.
Seeing this, I decide to re-flash. So I go through the regular checklist. Launch Titanium Backup to backup all the apps that are necessary for me. Whilst backuping an app, the rom glitches and closes Titanium and starts randomly closing the desktop so the rom is not usable. I restart.
After the restart I see that all my files have disappeared from the internal storage and I see that there is 25GB of free space (I know that I have about 1GB free). I do not panic and connect the phone to the PC and it also shows that internal memory is empty. I reboot to TWRP file manager which shows original folders but no content. I get worried.
I decide to just go ahead and flash CloudyStock. I know that there is 1GB free, ROM is 1.8GB. When copying to phone, transfer freezes after about half. This tells me that files are on my phone but for some reason are not accessible. So I download the AOKP ROM which is smaller, put it on my internal storage and go through the normal flashing process.
The problem now is that this got me to a bootloop stage and the only things I can enter is "Factory Hard Reset" and "Download mode".
If I use the Factory Hard Reset, it will wipe the internal storage and my files will be lost forever. And with the Download mode I can return to full stock but it will also wipe the internal storage.
In short: ROM glitched, can't see or access my files, flashed ROM, stuck in a bootloop, internal storage is almost full but PC shows that it is empty. I cannot get into TWRP.
Is there anyway to get all the data from internal storage safely to my computer so I can go ahead with the flash to stock?

[Q] /Storage Folder Empty?

Hi,
I've recently rooted my I9505 using Philz Touch recovery method, and I adjusted the platform.xml file to allow Titanium Backup to write direct to external SD. After rebooting, I get several "Unfortunately, xxx has stopped" for several apps. When I connect the phone via MTP the Card and Phone storage spaces both show remaining space, but are both empty, and if I open ES File Explorer and look in the /storage folder it's completely empty, which I assume is causing the problems with the apps as they can't find their stored files.
I've tried putting a backup copy of platform.xml back in /etc/permissions while in recovery, checked permissions on that file are set to 644, and even reflashed the same stock ROM back on the phone using Odin, but the errors continue.
Is there a way I can fix this without doing a wipe data/factory reset? I can get adb access as root in recovery if needed.
Thanks in advance!
B
Done a bit more testing this evening and if I do a factory reset and reflash to stock then everything works as normal. I then reflashed Philz Touch and did a custom nandroid restore of /data only, and the problem returned (the nandroid backup was taken after the issue started).
So the issue points to something in the /data rather than something in /system or elsewhere, if that helps anyone to diagnose?

[Q] Can't mount internal storage TWRP

So, things have massively escalated today and my phone appears to be soft bricked. Joy. I'll run through what happened.
1. I encrypted my phone using the built in tool in Cyanogen Mod. After it rebooted, it was glitchy and I lost a load of apps, the phone really wasn't working well. Rebooted again, but no improvement.
2. I went into TWRP (2.8.x) to restore my old backup, which was on the SD card. After the initial wipe of the internal storage, the log showed
E: Can't mount storage
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
and the restore failed.
3. I reboot and phone goes straight into recovery mode as there is no OS installed (the recovery wipes the internal storage first). Internal Storage is now showing as '0 MB'. I cannot find a way of mounting this storage anymore. Have tried factory reset (doesn't work because file system isn't mounted), and rebooting a few times but no avail.
* There seem to be some options about flashing a .pit file using odin, but I do not have this file. My phone is the Note 4 SM-N910F Model. If I can do this through Odin then maybe this will resurrect the file structure and make this storage mountable?
* There may also be another option using ADB but I still don't know what commands to use.
Any help would really be appreciated as it seems there is some possibility of a fix. That being said my hopes are not that high...
I believe I may have fixed this. I would like to keep this up here in case in helps anyone in the future, I would imagine this is only useful for people who have encrypted their device. I'm not an Android expert so can't be responsible for any damage to devices or data loss etc.
It seems that the encryption must have gone wrong somewhat and this is likely to have impacted on the file system.
Although I couldn't wipe on the device, I was able in recovery to FORMAT data (not just wipe). Go to the wipe menu, then format. After this, reboot into recovery again and you should be able to mount again. It rebuilt the filesystem too.
This should be a quick fix that may help a few people with the issues with not being able to mount the file system. I hope this can help at least one person!
I managed to restore from my backup after and phone is now working. Thanks anyway!
Is there any way to set the default storage of play store apps to the sd card?

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