Database Info

Best way to backup contacts?

First, I did use the search feature, but couldn't find anything specific to the Inspire. If this already exists, please feel free to link to it/close this thread. Thanks!
So, I can't seem to effectively back up my contacts. Titanium Backup doesn't do it, and I thought they were synced via Google. Not to mention I've had the same SIM card for YEARS and all my contacts have always been on there. Now, since I rooted my phone and started flashing custom ROMS, they have disappeared. Now I am without my 400+ contacts database, which I need.. So my question is, what is the best way to back up contacts, and is there any way to recover the ones I had?
Thanks in advance!

As long as you didn't choose not to sync with Google before you flashed, they are backed up. Most likely the problem you are having is getting them to import. Try going to Settings>Accounts and Sync> and manually sync your Google account.

stonewallmike said:
As long as you didn't choose not to sync with Google before you flashed, they are backed up. Most likely the problem you are having is getting them to import. Try going to Settings>Accounts and Sync> and manually sync your Google account.
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Click to collapse
I rip my employer a little I guess and store ALL my contacts to MS Exchange for several years now with nary a hiccup...that said since I've been on Android, Google does a fine job too. ... I think my free Sugar Sync account probably has them too...with this phone I have given up storing any contacts at all on the SIM card...because I have gone through what you are when simply switching phones or have phones stolen/lost in the past...but yeah make sure at least Google is backing them up...

It all depends on where you have chosen to save your contacts. If to phone then they may be lost forever. If to sim then simply import them back to your phone. If to Google account then as said above just re-sync.
When thinking about flashing rom's the first thing that you should do is make sure all contacts are backed up. Best choice is with Google. That way everytime you wipe data you can boot up your phone sync with Google and BOOM! They are there. Works a treat. Cheers.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

Thanks guys. I've had them backed up to Google before, and even restored them before, but it doesn't seem to be working. I just flashed the VU ROM after having been using the RCMix3D ROM for my Inspire, so I'll post the question on their page and see if it's a known issue with the ROM or anything.

Good luck.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

elijahpr said:
Thanks guys. I've had them backed up to Google before, and even restored them before, but it doesn't seem to be working. I just flashed the VU ROM after having been using the RCMix3D ROM for my Inspire, so I'll post the question on their page and see if it's a known issue with the ROM or anything.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have been on a captivate and now the inspire. Flashed upteen different roms and never had an issue with google restoring my contacts. Everytime I put the gmail addy in it pulls it all over.
Doesn't the htc sync account do that as well? Try doing that. If all else fails and you have them in say outlook or still on google then you can export them as a comma separated value (CSV) file and then put that on your sd card then import them via the people app. You can then save to sim via the people app.
I am on VU now and it restored flawlessly from gmail.
This is one app on the market that you can look at.
https://market.android.com/details?id=no.uia.android.backupcontacts&feature=search_result

I would recommend using my backup pro from the android market

Sdcard

Does resseting my mytouch wipe the memory card?
Sent from my HTC Vision using xda premium

Barry:// said:
Does resseting my mytouch wipe the memory card?
Sent from my HTC Vision using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope. Not unless you intentionally format sdcard from the settings or in recovery

Here's the thing I saved my friends contacts on the memory card and I can't rstore it ..idk why its saved as 0000.vcf but I can't restore it
Sent from my HTC Vision using xda premium

When you restore it I assume you're doing it from the More>Import/Export>Import from SD card>Phone then it'll start scanning for v card data....right?

Yes that's how I'm doing it ...is it wrong way?

Nope. That's the right way. But another thing is if you're not seeing the contacts show up they might not be set to show up..... just to double check.... Contacts>Menu>View>make sure checkbox next to SIM is marked.... That's the only thing I can think of aside from a buggered up export.

try copying your vcf file to your computer and importing it to outlook. then, sync your phone with outlook contacts and lemme know what you find out.
even easier... go to the market and check out something like vCardIO
because... guess what... yeah, we've got an app for that too, but ours is free.

Just wanted to add gmail backs up contacts as well. I've flashed multiple times not saving and gmail restores all of them everytime. It won't save texts though gotta use a sms backup, nandroid, tb or backup them yourself.
And reflashing won't touch the sd card unless you hit format by mistake which would stink if you were installing a custom rom lol.
sent from my ice cream sandwhich MT4GS

Droidmoder said:
Just wanted to add gmail backs up contacts as well. I've flashed multiple times not saving and gmail restores all of them everytime. It won't save texts though gotta use a sms backup, nandroid, tb or backup them yourself.
And reflashing won't touch the sd card unless you hit format by mistake which would stink if you were installing a custom rom lol.
sent from my ice cream sandwhich MT4GS
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Gmail only backs up contacts if you have it set to backup contacts AND save them to your gmail account when you add a new contact to your phone. I have come across more people that don't than do. Mostly the uninformed/first time android users that still think you're supposed to save them to your sim card like back in the old days.
OP: MyBackup Pro is probably the easiest solution to backing up contacts, call logs, bookmarks, dictionary, sms, mms, settings, android home, etc. I use MyBackup Pro for all the mentioned and have it on a schedule to backup each night in case I decide to flash a rom on a whim and TiBackup for my apps/game data even though MyBackup Pro does it too but I just don't like the way it restores them.

Thanks guys buh I figered out the problem.....'y google acoount had a pink sign on sync so theierfore all of my contacts were on my phone (not synced) and I only had 2 contacts on my gmail since sync wasn't functioning properly...any way when I backed up by expoorting I choose to export from google acount which had only two contacts and the rest 219 contacts were on the phone itself unsynced ..any way I wiped without knowing and boom all gone and no backup either....bummmer
Sent from my HTC G2 using xda premium

Barry:// said:
Thanks guys buh I figered out the problem.....'y google acoount had a pink sign on sync so theierfore all of my contacts were on my phone (not synced) and I only had 2 contacts on my gmail since sync wasn't functioning properly...any way when I backed up by expoorting I choose to export from google acount which had only two contacts and the rest 219 contacts were on the phone itself unsynced ..any way I wiped without knowing and boom all gone and no backup either....bummmer
Sent from my HTC G2 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bummer. That def sucks. Well I guess it's time for you to start going through your T-mo bill and putting a face to each call you placed lol j/k. I did that....a very long time ago and I still remember the horrible amount of time I had doing it lol.

Word 219 contacts dam that's to much
Sent from my HTC G2 using xda premium

You can manually sync them as well. I normally sync up once a week. Find a wifi or use a friends phone to tether. Its worth it I have about 110 contacts myself and more if I sync facebook lol.
sent from my ice cream sandwhich MT4GS

tmobile contact backup app from the stock rom may have saved your contacts for you. when i bricked my mt4g i thought i lost all my contacts but when i got the mt4gs that app brought them back automatically

[Q] Transferring contacts between OS's?

I just started reading up on rooting about 3 days ago so a lot of this is new to me but i couldn't find anything about this. I'm currently running CM9 ICS on on my infuse 4.0.4 and before i ever did any of this i used titanium backup and backed up all apps + system data while i was on froyo 2.2.1 and transferred it to my pc. I noticed they have a whole new people app on ics and i'm going to assume the old back up data is formatted for froyo, but i think they have the same destination?
data/data/com.android.providers.contacts/database
Something like that, how would i go about transferring them if possible? Apparently google never backed them up either. Any help is appreciated, thanks in advance.

One of the many possible issues when testing unfamiliar roms...lack of homework....
But when you log on to the phone..and setup your google accts it is not...syncing your contacts....?

Well its either they were never synced or it's just not working, i could just wait until the roms complete i guess but for the time being it would be a lot more convenient to have them if possible

Is data working for you...on the phone? Can you log on gmail on your pc and see your contacts there?

Nope just the contacts I've added recently added since switching to ics. i never had any other google accounts. any thing i can do with these?
com.android.providers.contacts-0155e16b1e02ab3e1f83406632029fc7.apk
com.android.providers.contacts-20120409-230535
com.android.providers.contacts-20120409-230535.tar
com.google.android.syncadapters.contacts-4a9248374bf4af8864bea57f2100d9d9.apk
com.google.android.syncadapters.contacts-20120409-230544
com.google.android.syncadapters.contacts-20120409-230544.tar
com.android.contacts-20120409-230533
com.android.contacts-bf86983ea79f37363d8d86c9b701b7b4.apk
com.android.contacts-20120409-230533.tar
Extracted using titanium backup on froyo

Just gonna quickly warn you. Never back and restore system data between roms. It could cause problems to arise. If you're gonna restore, restore missing apps with data. Don't restore system data or anything with system in it
Try a pizza taco sometime, if you don't know what it is, look it up then

Haha yeah i learned that.. i was screwing around with it with pretty much zero knowledge about this and ended screwing up 3 or 4 system processes and had to re flash it. Any suggestions? any way to make the files into vcard data? By the way i have no idea what that really is i just tried importing from sd and it said "Cannot find Vcard data."

Go back to froyo, restore your contacts with TB. Once you have contacts restored click the "menu" soft key. Click the import/export option. Choose export to sdcard or export to memory or something like that...that will create vcard data
Now flash cm9 and restore contacts from sdcard by importing from sdcard
I know, its a lot of work but its the only way I can think of to create the card data
Sent from my SGH-I997 using XDA

Devugly said:
data/data/com.android.providers.contacts/database
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can confirm that's where contacts are located, just used es file explorer and opened up the files as text...however I can not confirm changing the files in that directory with your old ones will work...
However if you do try to replace those files make sure you reboot after replacing
Good luck hope you get your contacts back
Sent from my SGH-I997 using XDA

I was hoping i didnt have to go back to stock, will try just replacing the files let you know how it goes thanks

i honestly think you shouldnt reaplce ICS apks with FroYo apks..
youre gonna screw things up trust me
do the long way and go back to froyo export a Vcard then go back to ICS and import
youll be safer and itll save ya the headache

No luck, contacts were just blank with a small scroll bar as if there was a lot on the page. probably going to re flash tomorrow i have work in 5 hours haha thanks again

SUCCESS. I have all my contacts and numbers thanks to this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1432962
I did this with no command prompt knowledge, let alone common sense. Thanks again!

Glad you found a simple way to get your contacts
Sent from my SGH-I997 using XDA

Yes, glad it worked out for you...

Wow, I haven't "transferred" contacts in years! A google email account solved all that headache

Jep56 said:
Wow, I haven't "transferred" contacts in years! A google email account solved all that headache
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that was exactly what I was saying...he must have had his contacts sync off or sync off in general...

Yes i always synced contacts from facebook, but this rom doesnt have that feature and market apps such as facebook sync only synced names and pictures. All backed up now though =]

Devugly said:
Yes i always synced contacts from facebook, but this rom doesnt have that feature and market apps such as facebook sync only synced names and pictures. All backed up now though =]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I dont use facebook much less sync with FB,...but ok, at least your up with your contacts.
I loaded the preview of the ICS and my contacts loaded up great when I log into google...?

bigjoe2675 said:
I dont use facebook much less sync with FB,...but ok, at least your up with your contacts.
I loaded the preview of the ICS and my contacts loaded up great when I log into google...?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah same here... I think contacts loaded up faster with ICS compared to GB and FroYo lol
Sent from my SGH-I997 using XDA

[Q] Missing Contacts After Changing to CM

Did some searching about this beforehand but couldn't come up with a solid answer. Really hoping someone can help me out.
I very recently changed my friend's MT4GS from the latest stock ROM to CM 10.1. The ROM works fine for the most part. The issue is that she seems to be missing the vast majority of her contacts which is extremely upsetting to her as I'm sure you can understand. The few that were retained were the only ones she had synced to her Google account. The really odd thing is that she has had this phone replaced on four different occasions (same model) and her contacts would always sync effortlessly going from one to the next (all of them being on the stock ROM until now).
I've tried enabling sync in the People app through Gmail, Facebook, and even adding her Hotmail account to the AOSP email app and syncing that as well. The latter did add plenty of contacts but not the ones she was used to seeing, just email contacts exclusive to that account, no phone numbers as such.
So basically there are a few questions that arise from all of this:
1: Is there a simple way to get the contacts back while still on AOSP?
2: If we were to revert back to the stock ROM would the contacts come back as they have in the past?
3: Why would the contacts sync on the stock ROM but not AOSP?
Any and all help is greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time.

She was probably syncing contacts with T-Mobile and not Google, go back to at least a stock based ROM, sync contacts, then transfer them to gmail, then you can flash any ROM you want as they will be tied to gmail
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

demkantor said:
She was probably syncing contacts with T-Mobile and not Google, go back to at least a stock based ROM, sync contacts, then transfer them to gmail, then you can flash any ROM you want as they will be tied to gmail
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the info and the tip. I'll give a shot and report back.

Its the most annoying thing for me with AOSP ROMs
The contacts she has "lost" are on her SIM card only right? Yet for some reason all AOSP and CM and AOKP
ROMs can't read those contacts...just the ones on the Google account
So best way is, return to stock as said above...i am sure all contacts are now available again, then sync them all to Google by just copying to Google account and flash back to your AOSP ROM and you are done
Was shocked the first time I rooted my desire z and missing some contacts too...but with time I got it why they where missing xD (still don't know why AOSP can't read SIM card contacts though)
Greets Vauvenal7
Sent from my SGS i9000

If you login to my-tmobile (assuming she was backing up to t-mo) go to mobile life-> contacts, then you can do an export of all the contacts that are there to something like VCF and then import to the phone. If they're out there, they're certainly not lost!

Success! Thanks everyone for the information and advice. You were all very helpful.
What I ended up doing was reverting back to a stock ROM, had T-Mobile automatically restore the contacts and exported them. Then simply imported them once back on AOSP. No biggy. :]
Thanks again! You can consider this thread solved!

[Q] new to the mini

hey guys im needing some help! I am switching from sprint to ATT and got this mini. can i keep whats on my old phone like apps? also i tried the contact part where it lets me move my contacts and it gave me a old list of contacts... do i need to update my gmail or what? i dont use it at all the gmail. I need to get my contacts over! if i do the face book app the i guess runs all the time on a main page on the phone will that use a bunch of data? any help and i have to read more i just got this beast and my old phone is a epic( piece lol). im asking because i work late and att is closed. any help or anything i need to know about this to get me going and such LMK. the guys over on the epic thread were great and i hope this group is the same. I have wanted a HTC for a couple years now! TY!

Nabisco_12 said:
hey guys im needing some help! I am switching from sprint to ATT and got this mini. can i keep whats on my old phone like apps? also i tried the contact part where it lets me move my contacts and it gave me a old list of contacts... do i need to update my gmail or what? i dont use it at all the gmail. I need to get my contacts over! if i do the face book app the i guess runs all the time on a main page on the phone will that use a bunch of data? any help and i have to read more i just got this beast and my old phone is a epic( piece lol). im asking because i work late and att is closed. any help or anything i need to know about this to get me going and such LMK. the guys over on the epic thread were great and i hope this group is the same. I have wanted a HTC for a couple years now! TY!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1) If your old phone is rooted you can use Titanium backup to backup you old apps and then restore them on your new phone.
2) Backup your contacts on your old phone to your Gmail account, then when you sign in on your new phone they should sync automatically (if they then don't manually sync them in the Accounts & sync settings.)

Ecstacy42 said:
1) If your old phone is rooted you can use Titanium backup to backup you old apps and then restore them on your new phone.
2) Backup your contacts on your old phone to your Gmail account, then when you sign in on your new phone they should sync automatically (if they then don't manually sync them in the Accounts & sync settings.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Where on my old phone can I do the gmail update to get my contacts? Just now thinking do I just turn on the sync?
As far as rooting I did want to root! I wanted to make the epic just a tablet games and music for my little man! Is there a way that is somewhat hassle free? I don't need anything special just games and music.
TY!

Nabisco_12 said:
Where on my old phone can I do the gmail update to get my contacts? Just now thinking do I just turn on the sync?
As far as rooting I did want to root! I wanted to make the epic just a tablet games and music for my little man! Is there a way that is somewhat hassle free? I don't need anything special just games and music.
TY!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's somewhat different for every phone, it should be under Account settings or something similar to that, then select your Gmail account, and manually sync them. You can check that they're backed up properly by logging into Gmail on your desktop and right under the Google logo there should be the word "Gmail" with a drop down menu, click that then go to Contacts, then make sure they're all there.
Look on the Epic sub-forum for how to root, it's a bit different for each phone. If you're fine with the stock UI on your phone I'd suggest just doing a factory reset and then using it as a tablet, if you wanted some sort of custom interface you'd have to check if something like that exists in the Epic sub-forum. There isn't much I can do to help with this, I've never used the Epic.

Ecstacy42 said:
It's somewhat different for every phone, it should be under Account settings or something similar to that, then select your Gmail account, and manually sync them. You can check that they're backed up properly by logging into Gmail on your desktop and right under the Google logo there should be the word "Gmail" with a drop down menu, click that then go to Contacts, then make sure they're all there.
Look on the Epic sub-forum for how to root, it's a bit different for each phone. If you're fine with the stock UI on your phone I'd suggest just doing a factory reset and then using it as a tablet, if you wanted some sort of custom interface you'd have to check if something like that exists in the Epic sub-forum. There isn't much I can do to help with this, I've never used the Epic.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
kinda pissed the phone doesnt have a sd card! the att guy had me do mobile transfer and got my contacts. but idk how well it will transfer my pics... i dont want doubles.