I want to switch from supersu to superuser, and having an interesting problem that supersu somehow covered up. I have a Nexus 5x running the stock rom. With every months upgrade I would flash using fastboot, go into twrp recovery before first full boot and remove a bunch of unneeded applications in /system/app. When I would boot up those applications would be gone. Somehow this isn't the case with superuser. I can still go into recovery and remove them, but when I boot up all the applications are still in /system/app. If I go back into twrp they are still shown as being missing. I've tried installing es file explorer, but it's unable to delete the applications once the system is up. remounting /system doesn't work either. Any help?
Unrooting supersu caused all the applications to come back; so does supersu not really delete them either, but somehow prevents them from showing up following the recovery scheme or something?
bsd1101 said:
I want to switch from supersu to superuser, and having an interesting problem that supersu somehow covered up. I have a Nexus 5x running the stock rom. With every months upgrade I would flash using fastboot, go into twrp recovery before first full boot and remove a bunch of unneeded applications in /system/app. When I would boot up those applications would be gone. Somehow this isn't the case with superuser. I can still go into recovery and remove them, but when I boot up all the applications are still in /system/app. If I go back into twrp they are still shown as being missing. I've tried installing es file explorer, but it's unable to delete the applications once the system is up. remounting /system doesn't work either. Any help?
Unrooting supersu caused all the applications to come back; so does supersu not really delete them either, but somehow prevents them from showing up following the recovery scheme or something?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You aren't doing something right or you don't have something setup correctly. With root, you should be able to unintelligible them completely.
When you removed them, did you wipe cache and dalvik/ART cache before rebooting? If not then the system probably still thinks they are there because they still have data loaded into cache.
I recommend sticking with SuperSU, superuser doesn't work as well as SuperSU
Sent from my SM-S903VL using Tapatalk
I've been googling a bit more. As it turns out there are two system partitions for nougat; in nexus 5x and some other devices apparently. This became more apparent when the file recovery-from-boot.p; which I rename in order to prevent recovery from being overwritten is not renamed when booting the OS. Nougat apparently pulls the system files from somewhere else. So whatever Chainfire did makes it boot the same partition as visible in recovery. Fully unrooting brings all those apps/system partition back. Haven't been able to find a good post that tells me how to to circumvent this without SuperSU; or exactly how this works.
I uninstalled Google Playstore using ES file explorer's root uninstaller and rebooted my phone. Then I reinstalled Google Playstore with an apk file (now shown as user app. The re-installation was success but the app keeps crashing after I tried to download an app with it.
I uninstalled Google Playstore in the first place because I encountered the "waiting for download" bug (apps stuck on that messages without downloading at all).
I cannot flash GApps in TWRP because it says /system partition not found.
I'm using Rooted Asus ROG phone, stock ROM 15.1630.1903.89, magisk
Please help
GphonePrince said:
I uninstalled Google Playstore using ES file explorer's root uninstaller and rebooted my phone. Then I reinstalled Google Playstore with an apk file (now shown as user app. The re-installation was success but the app keeps crashing after I tried to download an app with it.
I uninstalled Google Playstore in the first place because I encountered the "waiting for download" bug (apps stuck on that messages without downloading at all).
I cannot flash GApps in TWRP because it says /system partition not found.
I'm using Rooted Asus ROG phone, stock ROM 15.1630.1903.89, magisk
Please help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Anytime you uninstall/remove system files and apps or anytime you reinstall/replace system files and apps, it is best to boot into recovery then wipe cache and dalvik cache then reboot. The reason why this must be done is because when you remove/add stuff from/to system, the OS is looking for stuff that is there when it shouldn't be or is not finding stuff that should be there but isnt.
Wiping cache and dalvik then rebooting allows the device to rebuild cache as it should be for what is currently in system.
The most effective fix with the least possible issues in your situation is to reflash your stock firmware then flash TWRP on the device again then root the device again using Magisk.
Next time, before you add/remove system files/apps, boot into TWRP and create a nandroid backup of your current ROM, then, if you encounter issues when you add/remove system files/apps, you can boot into TWRP and restore the backup and you'll be restored to exactly what you had before you added/removed the system files/apps.
The ability to create and restore backups via TWRP is the main purpose for using TWRP, the ability to flash ROMs and such is a minor secondary feature or purpose of TWRP.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Droidriven said:
Anytime you uninstall/remove system files and apps or anytime you reinstall/replace system files and apps, it is best to boot into recovery then wipe cache and dalvik cache then reboot. The reason why this must be done is because when you remove/add stuff from/to system, the OS is looking for stuff that is there when it shouldn't be or is not finding stuff that should be there but isnt.
Wiping cache and dalvik then rebooting allows the device to rebuild cache as it should be for what is currently in system.
The most effective fix with the least possible issues in your situation is to reflash your stock firmware then flash TWRP on the device again then root the device again using Magisk.
Next time, before you add/remove system files/apps, boot into TWRP and create a nandroid backup of your current ROM, then, if you encounter issues when you add/remove system files/apps, you can boot into TWRP and restore the backup and you'll be restored to exactly what you had before you added/removed the system files/apps.
The ability to create and restore backups via TWRP is the main purpose for using TWRP, the ability to flash ROMs and such is a minor secondary feature or purpose of TWRP.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the detailed reply. I have re-flashed the stock ROM and re-rooted the phone now.
Now, I am just wondering why I am still encountering the "/system partition not mounted" error in TWRP for both (now and the previous time) rooting procedures? This prevents me from installing busybox and flash anything with TWRP.
PS: I am following the rooting guide here, since it is the most detailed one for newbies like myself. According the the screenshots shown in this guide, the OP also encountered the "/system partition not mounted" error in TWRP (system shown as 0MB, and before booting to system with TWRP, the message "no OS found" appeared). Hence I suspect his guide was not perfect despite getting root successfully. Mind having a look at the guide for me to see whether you could spot any missing/wrong steps please? (I know it is in Chinese but it does have loads of screenshots) I would really appreciate it. Thanks so much!
GphonePrince said:
Thanks for the detailed reply. I have re-flashed the stock ROM and re-rooted the phone now.
Now, I am just wondering why I am still encountering the "/system partition not mounted" error in TWRP for both (now and the previous time) rooting procedures? This prevents me from installing busybox and flash anything with TWRP.
PS: I am following the rooting guide here, since it is the most detailed one for newbies like myself. According the the screenshots shown in this guide, the OP also encountered the "/system partition not mounted" error in TWRP (system shown as 0MB, and before booting to system with TWRP, the message "no OS found" appeared). Hence I suspect his guide was not perfect despite getting root successfully. Mind having a look at the guide for me to see whether you could spot any missing/wrong steps please? (I know it is in Chinese but it does have loads of screenshots) I would really appreciate it. Thanks so much!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is your device an A/B partition device?
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Droidriven said:
Is your device an A/B partition device?
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's Asus ROG phone. seems like it is according to here: https://www.xda-developers.com/list-android-devices-seamless-updates/
GphonePrince said:
It's Asus ROG phone. seems like it is according to here: https://www.xda-developers.com/list-android-devices-seamless-updates/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is the problem then, the process of rooting and flashing TWRP on A/B devices is very much different than how it is done on other non A/B devices.
Look for instructions on how to use TWRP on devices that have A/B partitions.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Droidriven said:
That is the problem then, the process of rooting and flashing TWRP on A/B devices is very much different than how it is done on other non A/B devices.
Look for instructions on how to use TWRP on devices that have A/B partitions.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will look into it thanks
Step 0: introduction
Hello everyone. As you may or may not know, after unlocking, rebranding, updating and patching our P9's, we can now install a part of a big universe of brand new Treble ROMs into our devices. An example of that kind of ROMs is the OpenKirin team's AOSP-based ROMs, AndyYan's LineageOS or phhusson's Phh-Treble for a barebones pure Android experience.
But that experience so far is far from perfect. Aside from Q ROMs not booting yet on hi3650 devices like ours, some features may be missing such as camera support, GApps or [insert favorite mod here] which come in the form of flashable zips. A major problem now is that our phone's internal storage must always be encrypted at every ROM install. This poses some problems such as:
* Having to install Huawei's stock recovery every time you need to do a factory reset otherwise your brand new ROM is not booting when you wipe with TWRP.
* Not being able to flash ZIPs in TWRP from the internal storage.
* Having to install custom ROMs by flashing to /system through fastboot which is slow and can be interrupted
* On a fresh ROM boot, the phone takes extra time to encrypt and then on every subsequent boot it will take longer to boot.
Encryption brings extra security, but at the cost of usability and speed. Luckily for us, it can be disabled in favor of having a more traditional custom ROM + TWRP flashing workflow. This can be done by editing a fstab file in our device's vendor partition. Once the procedure is done you will be able to:
* do factory resets from TWRP without problems
* mount internal storage in TWRP and flash ZIPs without problems
* not need to juggle .img files to switch recoveries because everything will be possible from TWRP
Note: This effect is permanent. No need to do it again. You can also easily reverse it manually.
WARNING: YOUR INTERNAL STORAGE MUST BE WIPED CLEAN. BACKUP ANY IMPORTANT DATA TO AN EXTERNAL STORAGE BEFOREHAND. YOU WILL LOSE ALL YOUR FILES AND APPS.
Note: If you ever decide to reflash your stock EMUI firmware, remember that your device will be re-encrypted. If you get stuck at the boot logo after going back to EMUI from a decrypted device, reboot manually to recovery, do a factory reset in the stock recovery and try again.
Required:
* A backup of your important data
* A computer
* working Android install with root
* A working ADB/fastboot environment
* A USB-C cable with data connections
* Pretoriano80's TWRP for Treble-enabled Huawei P9
Your ROM, custom kernels and Magisk will survive the procedure. Don't worry about them.
Step 1: Modify the vendor fstab
Using MiXplorer, navigate to /vendor/etc. We're going to modify the fstab.f2fs.hi3650 file. Back it up in your SD card, because the internal storage will be wiped clean so if you mess the process up you don't want to lose it. Now open the original file with a text editor and edit it, go to the line that contains /data and change the forceencrypt word to encryptable.
Step 2: Flash TWRP
Through Fastboot, install Pretoriano80's TWRP. This is the best TWRP available for our device.
Code:
# fastboot flash recovery_ramdisk twrp.img
For the next step, we need to reboot to the recovery.
Code:
# fastboot reboot recovery
Step 3: Format internal storage
On TWRP, back your internal storage up if you haven't already. This is your last chance to do a backup.
After that, wipe your internal storage. Go to Wipe -> Format Data and confirm. The deed is done.
Now boot your system. ROMs should no longer push their encryption on you, and you can now mount the internal storage in TWRP.
Wattsensi said:
Step 2: Modify fstab and format /data
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This part is confusing, how to modify fstab?
copy pasted a guide from other users. You shouldnt modify anything and the decryption is a one time story, it breaks after first use.
I tested it on my P9 Plus & it worked man, thank you so much <3
dkionline said:
copy pasted a guide from other users. You shouldnt modify anything and the decryption is a one time story, it breaks after first use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1. No, it doesn't. I tried switching between several "Open"Kirin ROMs and GSIs using a TWRP flash+factory reset workflow, it works well.
2. This entire forum is either sparse solutions spread in deep crevices or hacks from juggling files and editing words in text...surely the guides are so unique, reformatting /data after removing its forceencrypt attribute in /etc/fstab is so unique and special! I'm not trying to throw down zgfg's effort but again, that guide was confusing and required juggling three TWRP copies. I'm just trying to make anyone unfortunate enough to still need to have one of these devices to be able to lessen the pain in the behind that is working with ancient unmaintained Treble implementations, buggy sdcardfs drivers, obscure camera interfaces, broken audio routing and drivers, and secretive ROM cooks who won't share their secret fixes restricting the universe of good ROMs to their own proprietary ROMs that don't get updated, or get updated once every 6 months. Sadly I don't have the time or resources to set a build farm or cook my own ROMs (you probably already know, hundreds of GBs downloaded and 6GB+ of RAM used) Please don't be like this, I like your work.
md sabuj said:
This part is confusing, how to modify fstab?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
With TWRP, mount /vendor. Then, use TWRP's ADB shell capabilities. Open a command prompt in your computer, and type 'adb shell' and enter. Then, navigate to /vendor/etc/, with the command 'cd /vendor/etc'. Then using vi or nano, edit the fstab.hi3650 file.
Look for the entry that starts with /data. Replace in the same line, 'forceencrypt' with 'encryptable'. Then save, wipe /data and reboot. Remember to investigate thoroughly for consequences and side effects on everything you do.
Btw, developing discussion and instructions from early 2019 about decrypting Data and Internal memory on P9 Oreo - decryption can be done also by use of TWRP instead of manually editing fstab:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/p9/how-to/emui-8-decryption-guide-wipe-t3906245
And a revised summary:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=80029346&postcount=1843
They were not necessarily targeting GSI but (at that time) OpenKirin ROMs.
Also, doesn't matter if for EVA AL10, DL00, etc.
Also for stock EMUI 8, but to be able to fully use TWRP (nandroid backup, wiping Dalwik - it's on Data partition, installing zip or img files from Internal memory instead from SD card)
Btw, instead of Terminal and Vi editor (for most of nowadays users their parents were not born yet in the era of pre-WYSIWYG editors, and I doubt if 0.1% would be familiar to navigate with Vi to a particular line and to delete/replace or insert something), one can simply use standard tools like MiXPlorer (root explorer) with its integrated text editor.
In MiXPlorer choose Root, grant the root access, visually navigate to /vendor/etc, click on fstab.hi3650 file, open as Text and edit without frustrations like with Vi editor ?
zgfg said:
Btw, instead of Terminal and Vi editor (for most of nowadays users their parents were not born yet in the era of pre-WYSIWYG editors, and I doubt if 0.1% would be familiar to navigate with Vi to a particular line and to delete/replace or insert something), one can simply use standard tools like MiXPlorer (root explorer) with its integrated text editor.
In MiXPlorer choose Root, grant the root access, visually navigate to /vendor/etc, click on fstab.hi3650 file, open as Text and edit without frustrations like with Vi editor ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for that, I revised and simplified the guide as much as possible.
btw, my P9 is now a secondary device meaning that I can experiment a little more on it. I can't build ROMs for now but will try to create a barebones kernel with useful features.
Wattsensi said:
Thanks for that, I revised and simplified the guide as much as possible.
btw, my P9 is now a secondary device meaning that I can experiment a little more on it. I can't build ROMs for now but will try to create a barebones kernel with useful features.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have ECOKernel by @dkionline for Oreo
zgfg said:
You have ECOKernel by @dkionline for Oreo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know, I am using it right now and it's a good kernel but I'd like to add some more things like lower minimum brightness, voltage control for undervolting and AutoSMP hotplugging. It runs pretty hot and the IPS display backlight burns my eyes even on the lowest setting
Can I use this method to decrypt P9 installed EMUI8?
md sabuj said:
Can I use this method to decrypt P9 installed EMUI8?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
@ant0nwax and me did use decrypted storage with b540, see the post #6 above:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=83386207&postcount=6
Specially, look at the second post linked there (post was in HWOTA7 thread):
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=80029346&postcount=1843
There was one catch there (was written for b540):
zgfg said:
Reboot to TWRP and perform the following, in this order:
- Wipe, Swipe to factory reset (not Advanced Wipe, neither Format Data)
- Install three ZIPs (all ogether, in queue): update_data_full_public.zip (from b540 download), b540-update_full_EVA-AL10_all_cn.zip (from b540 download, but fixed by Tecalote to be flashable by TWRP) and Enable-Huawei-OTA.zip (from Tecalote's OP instructions)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If I recall correctly after the long time ,(year and a half) - when you format Data you have to restore your b550 part that was installed to Data.
You must not use eRecovery bcs it would encrypt Data again.
Hence you must flash b550 by TWRP and there was a problem with that all_cn zip at that time, reporting me an error (cannot find now TWRP logs from that time to see what was the problem)
I discussed then with @Tecalote and he corrected me the script from the original update all_cn zip for b540 that TWRP was able to flash
As a result, we had EMUI 8, b540 with decrypted storage, giving to TWRP the full access to Data and Internal memory
It was also possible to go back to EMUI 8 with encrypted storage, basically by putting back stock Recovery, by installing latest firmware from eRecovery and by performing Factory reset with Wiping the cache
@Wattsensi: unfortunately, It doesn't work like this in my case. After switching to Chinese EMUI 8, I install Play Store, login to my Google Account and do Play Store things.
After modifying that file in Vendor, I go to recovery, wipe internal storage, wipe Data and restart.
At this moment, it's like after a factory reset, I have to start all over again, but I'm not encrypted.
Well, no matter what I do, I can't login to Google. I open Play Store, it tries to log me in ( the big circles started to spin), at that moment Play Store closes. I go to Accounts and try to login to my Google account from there, same thing. So, for me, Emui 8 is usable only before decryption.
I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong.
Nightwish1976 said:
@Wattsensi: unfortunately, It doesn't work like this in my case. After switching to Chinese EMUI 8, I install Play Store, login to my Google Account and do Play Store things.
After modifying that file in Vendor, I go to recovery, wipe internal storage, wipe Data and restart.
At this moment, it's like after a factory reset, I have to start all over again, but I'm not encrypted.
Well, no matter what I do, I can't login to Google. I open Play Store, it tries to log me in ( the big circles started to spin), at that moment Play Store closes. I go to Accounts and try to login to my Google account from there, same thing. So, for me, Emui 8 is usable only before decryption.
I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is indeed strange, and I do not recall the Chinese ROMs having Google services by default, you had to install GApps if I'm not wrong. Try flashing pico OpenGapps for 8.0 ARM64, wiping cache and doing a factory reset again. Sometimes GApps have issues when you don't flush the cache between fresh installs.
https://opengapps.org/
Nightwish1976 said:
Unfortunately, It doesn't work like this in my case. After switching to Chinese EMUI 8, I install Play Store, login to my Google Account and do Play Store things.
After modifying that file in Vendor, I go to recovery, wipe internal storage, wipe Data and restart.
At this moment, it's like after a factory reset, I have to start all over again, but I'm not encrypted.
Well, no matter what I do, I can't login to Google. I open Play Store, it tries to log me in ( the big circles started to spin), at that moment Play Store closes. I go to Accounts and try to login to my Google account from there, same thing. So, for me, Emui 8 is usable only before decryption.
I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wattsensi said:
This is indeed strange, and I do not recall the Chinese ROMs having Google services by default, you had to install GApps if I'm not wrong. Try flashing pico OpenGapps for 8.0 ARM64, wiping cache and doing a factory reset again. Sometimes GApps have issues when you don't flush the cache between fresh installs.
https://opengapps.org/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Be careful. Chinese EMUI 8 does come with Google Play Services (OP posts in HWOTA7 thread) and one only needs to install Google Play app.
Google Play Services were also preinstalled for users who recently updated to b550.
Btw, you didn't write are you on Al10c00b550 or what, but you also wrote that you had Playstore working on EMUI 8 before decrypting and formatting Data
Anyway, before installing MicroG, Open GApps or something, inspect do you still have or not Google Play Services installed.
There are apps like Play Services Info to inspect if Google Play Services, Google Services Framework and Google Play Store are installed (and what are their versions).
E.g, use this app from ApkMirror (since you cannot look for them and install from Playstore):
https://www.apkmirror.com/apk/weberdo/play-services-info/
(Not sure would it work installing Open GApps if stock Google Play Services are still beneath)
Thank you, guys gor your help. Yes, Ch EMUI comes with Google Play Services, one normally has to install only Google Play.
At the moment I'm just setting up my phone with the Lineage OS MicroG Pie ROM and I'm really enjoining it, but as soon as I decide to try something else, I'll put your suggestions to use.
After my experiment of trying out Beta 3 of Android Q failed apocaliptical I tried to restore the backup I made minutes before. But no matter what I do, I keep getting:
- bootloops (straight rebooting after showing the unlocked bootloader warning)
- restart into recovery
- Oxygen OS loading animation stuck and animation being very slow
- not getting it anymore but had it yesterday in the early stages of my disaster management: Qualcomm Crash POST
Despite that the backup was generated succesfully (at least thats what TWRP said)
I tried almost every guide out there.
- switching to rm -rf
- restoring only data, only boot, only system and a mix of those
- flashing the OTA before restoring backup
- uninstalling magisk und reinstallating magisk (with and without separate reboots)
-multiple wipes of single partitions and data formatting
The only good thing is that I don't get the 255 error anymore I had at the beginng, allthough I don't really know anymore how I did it.
At the end I am only able to restore everything with the MSNTOOL out there.
Is there any golden hint to get the data the be restored? The backup of /data is critical as there my authenticator and banking data are in there.
Thank you in advance
Edit: As I am slowly getting fed up with OnePlus and the problems (proximity sensor, adaptive brightness, whatspps microphone, twrp issues, lacking tech guides if at all) I thought about migrating to Pixel 5. Is it possible to migrate the data partition? Or are all backup partitions strictily device specific?
anphex said:
After my experiment of trying out Beta 3 of Android Q failed apocaliptical I tried to restore the backup I made minutes before. But no matter what I do, I keep getting:
- bootloops (straight rebooting after showing the unlocked bootloader warning)
- restart into recovery
- Oxygen OS loading animation stuck and animation being very slow
- not getting it anymore but had it yesterday in the early stages of my disaster management: Qualcomm Crash POST
Despite that the backup was generated succesfully (at least thats what TWRP said)
I tried almost every guide out there.
- switching to rm -rf
- restoring only data, only boot, only system and a mix of those
- flashing the OTA before restoring backup
- uninstalling magisk und reinstallating magisk (with and without separate reboots)
-multiple wipes of single partitions and data formatting
The only good thing is that I don't get the 255 error anymore I had at the beginng, allthough I don't really know anymore how I did it.
At the end I am only able to restore everything with the MSNTOOL out there.
Is there any golden hint to get the data the be restored? The backup of /data is critical as there my authenticator and banking data are in there.
Thank you in advance
Edit: As I am slowly getting fed up with OnePlus and the problems (proximity sensor, adaptive brightness, whatspps microphone, twrp issues, lacking tech guides if at all) I thought about migrating to Pixel 5. Is it possible to migrate the data partition? Or are all backup partitions strictily device specific?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try, booting into twrp... Format data. Type yes to format. Restore. Should boot.
@soka said:
Try, booting into twrp... Format data. Type yes to format. Restore. Should boot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did just exactly that on stock 10.0.0.11 to no avail, the TWRP restore went through fine but upon system reboot the phone stayed on the bootloader unlocked warning for about two minutes, then it rebooted straight into stock recovery.
It's beyond my understanding yet how the user data partition can cause the whole system to effing die.
My only hunch is that it has something to do with Magisk I had installed during the backup (encryption was disabled btw). But as I said I already tried running Magisk installer and uninstaller on different occasions with the same result. Also the only thing that should happen is that after restore and reboot the phone should tell me that Magisk isn't installed anymore.
Edit: So for now I reverted to full stock 10.0.11 and for the sake of experimenting I made a backup with system, boot and data of this stock rom and restored it succesfully. When I restore my actual data backup I get the same old restart and then it throws me back into TWRP. Is there any log I can check to see what's happening there?
Sorry for double post, but I think this might be very interesting for people with a similar problem as this seems to be very common with OnePlus phones.
So I found a very dirty and hacky way to get a least my most importants app running in the state they had during my backup I was trying to restore. Here's what I did, without any guarantee it might work for you or be stable in the end.
Code:
1. Revert the phone to a clean stock rom and update to the latest stable version (at the time of writing 10.0.11), it should be fully factory reset, aka like new. I am not sure but it may be necessary that you install the apps you want to restore first since the I am not sure the partition we use later contains the app AND the data too.
2. Unlock bootloader and flash latest TWRP, may it be official or mauronofio's
3. Make a backup of that current stock data partition
4. Restore data partition from your actual needed twrp backup (if it ends with 255, try to format data partition before in TWRP)
5. With the TWRP file manager navigate to the /data/data folder and copy everything to an external storage (I chose USB)
6. Restore the stock data partition
7. Now again with the TWRP file manager navigate to the /data/data folder on your external storage (should be /usbstorage) and search for the apps you need to restore (probably banking apps, authenticator, etc.), the name will be something like com.google.authenticator2.
8. Copy the folder of any needed app into the /data/data folder on your phone. Best you do it one by one just to make sure.
Now you can reboot to system. The apps should be fully restored. In my case it worked with Google Authenticator, Blizzard Authenticator, Consorbank Secure Plus (shows undefined error yet), Hue Pro. Maybe I will try more.
Edit: Consorsbank Secure Plus as you might guess is a tan generation banking app. When entering the pin when opening the app it shows "An error has occured". Dunno why, maybe a security checksum error or something. I found com.android.keychain and copied for the sake of trying too but it didn't help.
If you have any questions, suggestions or improvements, feel free to post!
When I used payload dumper on the OTA for this device I ended up with 34 .img files. When I used TWRP to backup all the partitions from the OxygenOS I end up with 12 .win files. When I used dd commands to get copies of boot_a & boot_b and persist, I end up with .img files. When I used dd commands to get EFS backup I ended up with modemst1.bin and modemst2.bin.
I have all these back ups now but I'm not sure which type of file to use and when.
I have TWRP and Lineage on my 8T and they're working great. But I'd like to now restore OxygenOS, install the latest OTA, re-install TWRP, then install a newer version of Lineage. There's a good chance I'll slip up and have to recover my phone at some point and I'd like to know first if I'm better off trying to get TWRP booted and then restoring all the .win backups, or if I should just flash all the .img files from the payload dumper.
Can anyone offer some tips or explain the difference?
Look in TWRP thread. It mentions what partitions to backup (and restore) when changing ROMs.
Look in TWRP thread. It mentions what partitions to backup (and restore) when changing ROMs.
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I've read through that thread and made a lot of notes, but I guess I'm just wondering at this point, since we have a fully-functional TWRP is it the case that as long as I have the .win files from the TWRP backup of boot, dtbo, super and data partitions that should be all I need?
Persist.img & Modemst1/2.bin & boot_a/b.img can be discarded? Or would you keep these on hand for other reasons?
FakeGemstone said:
I've read through that thread and made a lot of notes, but I guess I'm just wondering at this point, since we have a fully-functional TWRP is it the case that as long as I have the .win files from the TWRP backup of boot, dtbo, super and data partitions that should be all I need?
Persist.img & Modemst1/2.bin & boot_a/b.img can be discarded? Or would you keep these on hand for other reasons?
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Click to collapse
Persist and modem images presumably contain IMEI information, so better keep them somewhere safe. Boot_a/b.img can be discarded.
It's starting to make sense. Thank you for your explanation.
My phone had Lineage and TWRP installed and was running great, but I wanted to try out the backup and restore option of TWRP. So I backed up /data then used TWRP to restore the OxygenOS to the version I was using right before I installed Lineage. I restored OxygenOS to both slots and also I formatted /data.
After doing an minimal setup on OxygenOS, taking a quick look around to see if everything looked okay and rebooting to system a couple of times, I used TWRP to install LineageOS again. That seemed to work fine. I did minimal setup, took a look around, rebooted a couple of times, so far; so good.
I then followed the instructions from theincognito on Steps for backing up and restoring data in TWRP to restore the data partition:
It seemed to work fine, except I was never presented with a blank screen (a clue?) and the phone just booted to system normally. My apps and settings appeared to be restored BUT the 3-button system navigation icons (home/back/switchapps) were missing. So whenever I navigated away from the home screen there was no way to get back except to reboot the phone. It didn't matter if I switched to 2-button navigation or gesture navigation, none of it worked. So I guess the navigation options are all apps and those apps malfunctioned when /data was restored. Also, I could not enable Advanced Restart for the Power Menu. That's probably a system app, too. I didn't have a password on the phone at any time, or a SIM card installed. I know the TL;DR instructions in post #3 say that you should just reboot to system again if you have this problem, but doing so didn't fix the problem for me. I must have made a mistake at some point.
I ended up wiping the phone, doing a clean install of Lineage and setting up the apps and preferences the old-fashioned way.
I'd like to try this again to see if I can get it to work. Does anyone have suggestions of what went wrong?
Should I have tried restoring /data a second time before giving up and wiping the phone?
Does the fact I didn't get the expected blank screen after restoring /data have any significance?
Did the problem more likely originate with the backup process or the restore process?
Oh boy, it just dawned on me... Should I have also restored the backup of Boot/dtbo/Super? I assumed those wouldn't change if you were restoring to the exact same version of Lineage so I didn't bother with it.
I stumbled across a trick to get the restored data backup working again. I went to Settings --> Apps & Notifications --> App Info. Then I selected the option "Show System" from the list at the top with the 3 vertical dots. From the list of apps I selected 3-button navigation and then selected "force stop". After that, I rebooted and all the settings that were missing before were magically back in place, and both the Status Bar and the Navigation Bar were functioning and configured just the way I had them when I did the backup. I don't know anything about how system apps work so I can't explain why this helped, but I tested it twice with fresh installations of LineageOS and it worked exactly the same both times.
I should add that between this post and the one above from February 1st, I have re-installed Oxygen OS many times using old and new OTA zips, and installed Lineage OS several times, first on one slot then the other. And each time I've restored various back ups of LineageOS system files and LineageOS data files following the instructions, but always the result was a partial restoration of user configurations and missing status and navigation bars. I wonder that I'm the only person who found that booting twice after a data restore didn't bring back those menus. But hopefully if it happens to someone else they'll find this post and know what to do.